Environment

University of Florida researchers morphed the casual comments people leave on Google Maps and TripAdvisor into scientific data that has figured out why some parks rule while others feel like vapid green space.

Estuaries, such as the area where the Caloosahatchee River mixes into the Gulf, are essential for the health of our coastal ecosystems, where two bodies of water, usually saltwater and freshwater, meet and mix.

Jean Hall calls the burrowing owl her “spark bird,” meaning it launched her interest in bird photography. Her image of an owl won a major award from the National Audubon Society. Now a resident of Maine, Hall won the national 2025 Conservation Award for her photo of a burrowing owl on Marco Island.

It's September, usually a busy month for tropical systems. The African monsoon is the factory of tropical waves, and the Atlantic Basin is all fair game.

Animal rights groups are encouraging supporters to apply for bear hunting permits to limit the number of bears killed in December.Starting Friday, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission will begin accepting applications for 187 permits that will be issued for a December hunting period. The permits will be awarded through a lottery-style process and would entitle people to each kill one bear.

Days after the city of Miami Beach filed a similar case, Fort Lauderdale has challenged the legality of directives by the Florida Department of Transportation to remove art and markings on streets.Fort Lauderdale filed its challenge Monday at the state Division of Administrative Hearings, arguing that the department did not go through a legally required rule-making process. Such directives went to local governments across the state and have drawn heavy attention, in part, because they required removing LGBTQ-themed rainbow crosswalks.

Meteorological fall across is expected to be warmer and wetter across the Southeast. Forecasters are highlighting warmer sea surface temperatures across a large part of the Atlantic basin as being one of the root causes.

A deadline last week for Florida’s local leaders to remove all street art has come and gone, but in some cities the rainbows and colored roads haven’t disappeared. It’s unclear what state leaders will do in cities where elected officials have blown past their time limit.Some cities, including Orlando, Tampa, St. Petersburg and Gainesville, reluctantly agreed to have their streets paved when faced with a decision between art and state funding. Others, however, are using whatever leverage they can to keep their street art.

Architect Selma Goker Wilson gets giddy every time it pours at her Sarasota home. She watches with excitement as her labor of love — a rain garden she and her husband built themselves — is doing an effective job at diverting the heavy flow of water coming off their roof into a downspout and onto flowers and plants.“Working on it was very therapeutic, learning about all the plants, but seeing the water come out, we come out every time it rains, like ooh, how's it doing?” said Goker Wilson.She and husband Christopher Wilson, an architecture historian at Ringling College, find joy in adjusting stones and moving plants to increase the amount of stormwater that filters down into their yards instead of flowing onto their concrete street out front. They say it’s about being good stewards to the environment.