Our Parks Worth Fighting For pt. 4, pt. 1.1

For the Birds

In the late 1800s most of Florida was considered ‘open land’, in a time when land was becoming more scarce. While some areas along the coast, and in the north were growing into full cities, much of the state was less developed than developers would dream. People were already living there of course. The Seminole, the Miccosukee, the remnant of early settlers from before it became a state, and early homesteaders, most of whom were immigrants from Europe, the Bahamas, and beyond and more.

But the Everglades (the greater Everglades) was seen as a nearly impenetrable tropical mire. But progress wouldn’t let that be. And some of those early settlers learned to traverse the swamps, pole through the marshes, and hack through dense vegetation to reach areas thought to be impenetrable.

One of the main reasons people were willing to foray into the nearly impenetrable swamps and mashes: Bird Feathers.

From the the late 1800s to the early 1900s, there was an insatiable apatite for beautiful feathers to adorn fashionable hats around the world, and one of the best places for bird feathers, snowy white ones, flagrant pink ones, beautiful blue ones, and everything in between was the Everglades. So, many people went into the Everglades to find pretty birds with pretty feathers and then kill them to take those feathers. Because feathers were worth more gold.

Bird feathers were the height of fashion.

More than 100 years after Yankee doodle, everyone wanted to stick a feather in their cap. The white feathers from snowy egrets might adorn a wedding veil. The vibrant flamingo feathers would be woven into a pink feathered tiara to match a pink feathered boa. The Green wings and golden shoulders of the ill-fated Carolina Parakeet would be clipped to make a feathered broach.

The craze for beautiful bird feathers was so staggering that in the by 1900 an ounce of feathers could be worth more than double an ounce of gold.

That fashion came at a price. That insatiable appetite for bird feathers shaped the history of the Everglades, the ecology of Florida, and helped to shape the future of the environmental movement. Efforts to get feathers, especially the most valuable snowy egret, roseate spoonbill, and colorful tri-color heron feathers devastated not just the current bird populations but the very future of those bird’s existence. And there’s no surprise as to why.

Accounts from the time detail the hunting practice which destroyed bird populations. Hunters would stalk rookeries, and shoot as many of the adult birds as possible, leaving the young to starve and die. Those same accounts also detail how hard it was to get those feathers. Plume hunters would have to slog through swamps, and fight to keep their best hunting grounds secret. But, for them, the prices made that effort, and destruction was worth it!

Former hat material. Now park icon.

But the burgeoning environmental movement of the early 1900’s came with an increased understanding that humans can negatively impact their environment forever. Gone was the dodo, gone were the passenger pigeons, and those paying attention realized that other species of bird were on their way out. Especially in Florida, and especially because of the trade in plumage for hats.

But, for the people hunting feathers, it was a way to make a living. And even those who began to recognize the problem, were often causing harm as well. Audubon shot more birds than he illustrated. Early Ornithologists hunted even critically endangered species in an effort to record them. And while extinction was a more widely known concept than it had been a century previous, the entire Everglades was open and seemingly abundant for the plucking. It was hard to believe, or to convince people that the birds were really disappearing.

Realizing that something was happening, understanding that the trade in feathers coming out of the Everglades couldn’t be sustained, Scientists began to do bird counts, and study the populations. And with these studies they recognized a very obvious trend, the many vibrant valuable birds of southern Florida were on their way out.

Something had to be done. . .

Ok. That’s the end of this one.

I’m not going to lie. Recent(ish) events have made it a lot harder to write these. Not because I lack information or time, but because I’m overwhelmed with what I want to say.

So, for a new experiment, and in an effort to keep myself pushing ahead. I’m going to break up my longer articles into shorter pieces for a while, and go a little lighter on pictures and illustrations.

I’ll probably collect each of these parts into a longer summary at the end. But I’m hoping that by bite-sizing these, I’ll be better able to tell the story and get to the point.

That point still being:

Our parks are awesome! They are worth protecting. And they are definitely worth fighting for.