( 'Invisible Wings' song ) ( frogs calling ) ( thunder ) Ranger: My name is Larry Perez and I am a ranger with Everglades National Park. And, I do a lot of outreach and education work for invasive species in the area. We are right now at the Anhinga Trail which is one of the most popular visitor areas in the park. What a lot of folks do not realize is that some of those animals that they are seeing out here on the trail and some of the plants are not only nonnative to the area... ...but they are actually species that we are trying tirelessly to eradicate from the park. Native species are those that either have occurred, now occur, or may occur in a given area through natural processes. And, that stands in stark contrast to an exotic species which is one that occupies an area either directly or indirectly as a result of human actions, be that, intentional or accidental. Fortunately for us, the vast majority of exotic species do not adversely impact the ecosystems that they are introduced to. But, those that do are generally termed invasive species and in terms of management, those are the ones that we typically target. The park has been actively engaged in managing nonnative exotic species for decades now and it remains at the forefront of our efforts here as far as resource management. In a moment, we are going to show you a few of those more high-profile species and some lesser known species you may not have heard about... ...and take you out in the field with researchers to show you what we are doing about the problem and how we are day-to-day managing this very important issue. ( 'Arcadia' song ) Biologist: Well? Where did he go? Is that not amazing? That guy was almost 12 feet!? Yeah, 12 foot snake, vanished. We are releasing these snakes with tracking devices in them so we can view where they are going, how far they travel, what kind of habitat they are using. The next reason is because a lot of times, a male will lead us to more females or vice versa. So, release one, catch multiple. We really want to learn more about these animals and study their movement and study their habits and their habitat. It is giving me the same thing. I think it might be further out here. 90, 92, 95... ( screams and laughs ) See, that's how cryptic they are: you can step right on one and not even realize it. Biologist: Burmese pythons, I think can be summed up right now where we are with them: As you may or may not know, they are an invasive species. They come from southeast Asia. They come here through the pet trade?either intentional or unintentional releases. Some combination thereof perhaps. We will never know exactly how they got released. Showed up here deep in the park in the mid-1990s. Maybe we have information that suggests they may have even been here as early as the mid-1980s. Needless to say though, they are here as a result of the pet trade. They were brought in here, imported and then bred locally through captive breeding and distribution for sale. They were purposefully imported like a lot of other exotic pets and found their way either intentionally or unintentionally into the wild. There are lots of Burmese pythons out in the wild. Most everyone agrees that given their reproductive potential and their distribution where we find them now... ...that there are thousands if not tens of thousands of Burmese pythons in south Florida. They have a very broad diet. They eat lots of birds, lots of mammal species, and they also successfully eat and consume alligators. They have the potential to eat many of our threatened or endangered or imperiled species that we may have. It is hitting hard right here, really hard. There is the snake right there. See it? Coiled. I don't think they provide any more of a danger to humans than the dangers we already have out there. I think that is an important point to make. It can be a dangerous place whether it is reacting to bee stings, whether it is hydration, whether it is the pinnacle rock, or whether it is an alligator or any of our venomous snakes. There is a reason to pay attention to what you are doing! You guys still see him? He just popped his head up right here. You can see his head. He is taking bubbles? ( 'Arcadia' song ) Biologist: Those are all jewelfish. Volunteer: Amazing, wow, they are beautiful. Oh, look at this: They color up. Volunteer: What is it? See the jewelfish with the red tails? Oh yeah, there is lots of them, wow! So, these are our African friends? African jewelfish. Volunteer: So somebody put them in the aquarium and then they got in here? Is that how it generally works? Yeah, what is the best theory these days of where these guys come from? Probably the aquarium industry. In 2000, we first collected the African jewelfish within Everglades National Park. Within this ten years that the African jewelfish has been in the park, it has really become one of the most abundant freshwater fish within the shorter hydroperiod marshes. Have they shown any impact? Have they had any adverse impact? We don't know, yet. The numbers that we tend to catch them in some areas suggest that there could very well be an impact. We've got a park-wide monitoring effort. We are looking primarily to identify, try to find a lot of these nonnative species and to see how their distribution changes over time. So, we've had this big park-wide sampling effort going on since 2004 and we have been able to track how the African jewelfish has been spreading in the park. So, that is a female Marsh killifish and she is filled with eggs. You worry that it is a problem; it is hard to know if it is a problem. I am extremely curious about the degree to which it is a problem. I think the problem would be if the new fish that have been introduced are extinguishing all the native species. We found pockets of water, certain sinkholes here, where we would pull out ten or fifteen African jewelfish to just one or two native sunfish. So, it is pretty surprising to see. And some of the introduced species are extremely colorful and they are interesting in their own right too. ( 'Arcadia' song ) Biologist: Originally, it is from Australia and it was introduced into South Florida around the late 1800s by humans. And, it is still here today. The reason that it can be a problem is it can displace the native vegetation. Some of the top invasives that we deal with are not only Melaleuca, but we also have Brazilian pepper, Australian pine, Lygodium, also known as Old World Climbing Fern. It is part of the mission statement of the National Park Service is to manage for invasive or nonnative/exotic species. So, it is also part of the Park Service's mission to preserve the native habitat. The best way I think to try and control it is using an integrated approach to it. So, we will use both mechanical methods to chop at the tree and either cut it down or we will just girdle it. And then, we will use a herbicide. This tree right here now should no longer exist. You can not just go through and treat it once and then turn your back on it. You gotta make sure that you are continually monitoring the areas that have been treated. And, you try to get back to them for some follow-up treatment and that is where you can really make your progress. ( 'Arcadia' song ) These are walking catfish: Clarias batrachus They are a nonnative species. We had a big rain shower this morning. So, they are probably trying to relocate from a hole where they were in the water. And trying to find a bigger body of water to persist through the dry season. And these ended up on the road and some are stranded in the higher ground areas where there is not much water. They don't seem to be able to always find the better habitat..the grass is not always greener, I guess. ( 'Arcadia' song ) ( helicopter starting up ) This morning we are going to go out to an area on the western part of Everglades National Park where we released a biocontrol, the Brown lygodium moth. That is a biocontrol for Old World Climbing Fern, or Lygodium. As we are flying, I'm going to probably be looking and monitoring for general other non-native plants that are out there. Within Everglades National Park, we know there to be just a little over 1,000 different species of plants. And, of that, a little over 200 of them are thought to be nonnative. We estimate that there is about 200,000 gross acres of land infested within that million and a half acres with some type or another of an exotic species. The area that we released the biocontrol in is one of the higher levels of infestation of Lygodium that we have within the park?which is one of the reasons that we released the biocontrol there. There is not a lot of roads out there to get us to where we need to go. The remoteness and inaccessibility is definitely a challenge. We first detected Lygodium in Everglades National Park in 1999. And, at that time, we estimated the coverage of Lygodium to be, I believe, around 200 acres. And, presently we estimate it to be around 10,000 acres. This is Old World Climbing Fern, otherwise known as Lygodium microphyllum. Some of the features that I use to recognize it are it is this bright, green color typically. And, it has these fine, sort of small, delicate looking leaves. It tends to climb up other plants and use them as support. And, this is a good example. It has just shown in other habitats and in other areas that it has completely overgrown tree islands where there is nothing, literally some of the photos I've seen of it have shown literally nothing but Lygodium. But, again, it is such a challenge just to get out here and try and figure out what is going on with this one specific spot over the whole, huge landscape of the Everglades. ( 'Arcadia' song ) It is a fantastically beautiful landscape. If you look around, there are birds flying through the sky and the herons and the egrets are hunting in the corners. And, the Everglades team has just been fantastic to work with. These biologists are unbelievably dedicated and they are out here day after day, year after year counting the fish... ...so that we can be sure that the habitat remains beautiful and as it should be and as it always was. I would hope that the Burmese python is used as a poster-child, a poster-snake, for this larger issue of ... ...are we doing the right things and do we have everything in place that we can have to prevent this from happening next time. Whether it is laws, regulations, education, outreach, whatever it might be, the tools to respond. All of that in a package, lets try and avoid this. It was about an 11.5 to 12 foot snake and as soon as it hit the water, it was gone. Some people suggest: If there is a python problem, why don't you just run out into the Everglades and catch them all. But, that right there just proves that it is not that easy. There could be a 15 foot snake right behind you right now and you would not see it. Filmmaker: Or, behind you!? Yeah, there probably is actually. ( 'Arcadia' song )
