Florida's freshwater springs were among the area's main attractions.
The springs were used by the Indigenous Americans for thousands of years. Reports of clear water gushing from cavernous holes in forest floors fueled myths about the Fountain of Youth.
White Sulphur Springs, on the banks of the Suwannee River, became one of Florida's first commercial tourist attractions after sulfur springs were believed to have therapeutic properties. By the early 1900s, glass-bottomed boats gave tourists a fish's eye view of Florida's springs, and the pristine underwater landscapes attracted early filmmakers. Dozens of movies and television shows were filmed underwater at Silver Springs, a group of springs in Marion County.
Florida has the most freshwater springs on the planet. Every day, the state discharges billions of gallons of water to the surface from more than 1,000 freshwater springs. Florida's inland water-based recreation industry depends on springs for critical habitat for aquatic animals. Visitors from around the world come to Florida to fish, kayak, tube, swim and scuba dive through the miles of underwater caves that connect springs to the aquifer and pipe water to the surface. Rural economies are helped by springs tourism.
Florida's springs are at the center of a slow-motion environmental tragedy, despite their fundamental role in the state's tourism industry.
Over the last several decades, a combination of development, population growth, climate change, over pumping of the aquifer and pollution from agriculture and sewage have wreaked havoc on Florida's springs. Many springs have reduced water flow. Others have stopped.
One of the first casualties was Kissengen Spring. The Peace River used to hold more than 20 million gallons of water a day. Members of the military used the spring as a resort during World War II.
Between the 1930s and the 1950s, the water flow from the spring gradually reduced to a trickle. The spring stopped flowing in the early 1960s. A report from the United States Geological Survey shows that between the 1950s and 1975 the amount of water in the ground was lowered by 60 feet. The water stopped flowing when the elevation of the water in the aquifer dropped below the elevation of the spring vent.
White Sulphur Springs, one of Florida's first tourist attractions, stopped flowing for the first time in 1977 because of the declining water tables.
Pollution from sewage, farm fertilizers, and confined animal feeding operations have flooded springs with excess nitrogen, which has led to blooms in springs across the state. The white, sandy bottoms and waving thickets of eelgrass featured in films from the 1940s and 1950s have been replaced by thick mats of green, hairy algae. The ecosystems around springs are collapsing because of the absence of eelgrass.
Volunteer scuba divers remove the algae at Silver Springs by hand. The Silver Springs Professional Dive Team cleans the bottom of the glass bottom boats so visitors can see the old underwater movie sets, which the divers must also clean.
The Florida Springs Initiative was signed into law by the governor in 2001, and the State of Florida officially recognized that most of Florida's springs were in trouble more than two decades ago. The program gave the first of several pools of money for research, monitoring, education and landowner assistance to address declining spring flows.
Scientists have been able to track the decline of Florida's springs in detail thanks to the data collected by the initiative. The data shows that efforts to protect springs have been ineffectual, as the amount of pollution continues to increase.
Restoration work in the Crystal River shows that some damage can be reversed. The second largest spring group in Florida is Crystal River. Crystal River used to be a famous destination for fishing and scuba diving. In the 1960s and 1970s, development, dredge of canals for boat-based communities and pollution caused the river's eelgrass beds to collapse and be replaced with blankets of algae. Crystal River's visibility deteriorated until it rarely exceeded 10 feet.
Over the last six years, the community organization Save Crystal River and the aquatic restoration company Sea & Shoreline have used a combination of state and federal funding to remove more than a quarter billion pounds of algae and nutrient-rich muck from the bottom of Crystal River.
As the replanted eelgrass beds have expanded, they have improved visibility and now even support a year-round population of Florida's most famous vegetarians: manatees.
All of Crystal River's problems have not been solved by the successful eelgrass replanting project. The water that comes out of the Crystal River continues to get a little saltier as a result of sea level rise and pumping. Steady improvements in water clarity and a growing population of manatees are supporting a thriving ecotourism industry and show what can be accomplished when state governments and local communities work together and draw upon scientific data to save their springs.
The associate professor of geology at the University of South Florida is also a dive instructor and a photographer. You can follow his work on social media.
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