Florida Reference Libraries

The Florida black bear (Ursus americanus floridanus) is a subspecies of the American black bear. It once held a range that included Florida and southern areas of Georgia and Alabama. Today it occurs in these areas and in southern Mississippi, but its range is now fragmented. This species prefers a habitat within forested areas like sand-pine scrub, wetlands, oak scrub, and upland hardwood...

Dry Tortugas National Park is located in the Gulf of Mexico in the United States. The park consists of a small chain of coral islands, comprising 64,701 acres, but only 104 acres of land. The islands are about seventy miles from Key West, Florida and comprise the far western portion of the Florida Keys. The first European explorer to visit the area was Juan Ponce de León, who named the islands...

Everglades National Park is located in the state of Florida in the United States. The park holds 1,508,538 acres of land and holds twenty percent of the original Everglades. This park is the third largest national park in the lower forty-eight states. The area was once inhabited by Native American tribes, like the Calusa and Tequesta peoples, and the Seminole people, a mixture of Creek people,...

Biscayne National Park is located in the southern area of Florida in the United States. The park holds 172,971 acres, of which ninety-five percent consists of water. Native Americans first inhabited the area when water levels were low in the Biscayne Bay. Evidence has been found in the area supporting the inhabitance of other Native Americans, like the Tequesta people, from at least 2,500 years...

David Walker was a United States Navy officer and a NASA astronaut. He was born David Mathieson Walker on May 20, 1944 in Columbus, Georgia and graduated from Eustis High School in Eustis, Florida in 1962. He then went on to attend the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland and received a Bachelor of Science degree in 1966. Upon graduation, he went through flight training in...

Norman Earl Thagard is considered to be the first American cosmonaut. He is an American scientist and has retired from being a NASA astronaut after his selection in 1978. He also achieved Medical Doctor and climbed the ranks in the United States Marine Corps to Captain. Thagard logged 140 days, 13 hours and 24 minutes in space before retirement. He currently is a professor at the Florida State...

Debbie formed in the warm waters of the Southeast Gulf and slowly moved northward. Debbie got picked up by the trough which was located to the North of it for a time which allowed it to make the initial turn towards Florida. Once it got near Florida, it got stuck in between the trough and ridge that was back to the west causing the storm to stall in one place or become stationary. This occurred...

Symbol: WOGL2 Group: Monocot Family: Lemnaceae Duration: Perennial Growth Habit: Forb/herb Native Status: L48    N Synonyms:   WOFL2 Wolffia floridana (Donn. Sm.) Donn. Sm. ex Hegelm.   WOGL4 Wolffia gladiata Hegelm.   WOGLF Wolffia gladiata Hegelm. var. floridana Donn. Sm.   WOFL Wolffiella floridana (Donn. Sm.) C.H. Thomp. Distribution: County...

Symbol: VICIF Group: Dicot Family: Vitaceae Duration: Perennial Growth Habit: Vine Native Status: L48    N Synonyms:   VIAU4 Vitis austrina Small   VISI4 Vitis simpsonii Munson 1887, non 1890   VISO4 Vitis sola L.H. Bailey Distribution: County distributions for the following U.S. states are available at PLANTS:FL, NC, SC Classification:    ...

Symbol: VASCC2 Group: Dicot Family: Valerianaceae Classification:       Kingdom   Plantae – Plants Subkingdom   Tracheobionta – Vascular plants Superdivision   Spermatophyta – Seed plants Division   Magnoliophyta – Flowering plants Class   Magnoliopsida – Dicotyledons Subclass   Asteridae Order...