The Northwest Florida Wetlands and Wildlife

In a way, you could consider us as camp followers - like those civilians during the revolutionary war who provided supplies, services, and emotional support to the troops of the Continental Army. It started with our son in the Army when stationed at Fort Myer in Arlington and me on a detail in Beltsville in the spring 2005 and then moving here in January 2006 - mostly picking up the tab for dinner every other week or so. And then when our youngest entered the Naval Academy in July 2006, my wife and I live only 10 minutes from the Yard, and so provide a quiet retreat and meals and beds to company mates when ever asked, or a fast food pickup and drop off - only a phone call away. So, with flight school a reality just over the horizon, and a report date of October 1 already locked in, why not take a look ahead of time at the environs around the Naval Air Station at Pensacola - you never know, birding and tracking training craft as they dart across the sky may become a new pass time in our future.

The Pensacola Bay system includes five interconnected estuaries: Escambia Bay, Pensacola Bay, Blackwater Bay, East Bay, and Santa Rosa Sound. The watershed also includes three major river systems: the Escambia, Blackwater, and Yellow rivers. The system also includes numerous tributaries of these estuaries and rivers including the Shoal River and Titi Creek tributaries of the Yellow River. The watershed covers nearly 7,000 square miles, about one-third of which are in Florida. The watershed includes the majority of Escambia, Santa Rosa and Okaloosa counties, northwestern Walton County, and a substantial area of southern Alabama. The entire system discharges into the Gulf of Mexico, primarily through a narrow pass at the mouth of Pensacola Bay.

The Escambia River is a major alluvial river, which extends 240 miles northward from Escambia Bay to Bullock County, Alabama, as the Conecuh River. Its drainage area covers over 4,200 square miles, about 90 percent of which are within Alabama’s borders. The Yellow River extends 110 miles from the eastern shore of Blackwater Bay to a point northeast of Andalusia, Alabama. Its drainage basin covers 1,365 square miles, with 64 percent within northwest Florida. The Blackwater River drains approximately 860 square miles, of which 81 percent are in Florida's Santa Rosa and Okaloosa counties. The river originates north of Bradley, Alabama, flows about 60 miles, and discharges into Blackwater Bay. The estuarine component of the system covers approximately 144 square miles and extends approximately 20 miles inland from the Gulf of Mexico.

The Pensacola Bay system supports an array of biological communities and species characteristic of a Gulf Coastal Plain riverine and estuarine system. Estuarine habitats include benthic microalgae communities, seagrass beds, oyster beds, salt marshes, planktonic and pelagic communities, and unvegetated soft bottoms. Freshwater habitats include alluvial and Blackwater rivers, bottomland hardwood forests, tupelo-cypress swamps, seepage swamps, and tidal fresh marshes. Primary land uses include an increasing urbanized area, silviculture, and state-owned forest lands (1). Shown are examples of the kinds of migratory birds that are protected in Florida and rest of the United States: a. cattle egret, b. snowy egret, c. tree shallow, d. white ibis, e. tricolored heron, f. little blue heron, and g. double-crested cormorant.
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(1) The above information was copied from the Website of the Northwest Florida Water Management District. More information can be viewed at: http://nwfwmdwetlands.com/index.php?Page=22