Field trip Friday: Grassy Waters Everglades Preserve

Our field trip adventures for Honors Field Biology led us to the Grassy Waters Everglades Preserve for a day of canoeing and mucking in the mud [dip netting] looking for treasures. Our field guide, Sarah is an excellent naturalist and spoke on a wide variety of topics [ecology, geology, history, wetland chemistry, and more]. It was very informative.

Grassy Water is a protected 24 square mile wetlands ecosystem on the northeastern edges of the Florida Everglades system. It serves as the fresh water supply for the city of West Palm Beach and other towns nearby.

It is a fun place to visit. They also have a great boardwalk and education center, for those not wanting to get in the water.

Here are the pictures of our day out in the field.

This is where we parked the canoes and went to try out our dip netting skills to see what lives in the mud. We put our catches in buckets then went to analyze them. Some of our finds included crayfish, dragonfly larvae, tadpoles and small fish. Don't worry, everything was released back into the water! Another successful trip. Thanks Dr. Wetterer.