Let's just say Everglades National Park has some unusual geological features. Hike along Long Pine Key Trail and you'll see white outcroppings that look like piles of oat meal or the ashened remains of a recently burned pile of garbage. Or the jagged pits along the Pineland Trail. But this hole tops them all, perhaps 15 feet across and six feet deep, marked with "stalactites" hanging along the edges as if this was an opening to a lost world. It is not. Or at least we don't think it is.
Pretty much the entire Florida Peninsula sits atop a bed of limestone rock. Limestone is basically calcium carbonate; mix it with acidic water, it will react in various ways and form what geologists call karst topography. In parts of Florida, karst is responsible for sinkholes that can swallow a house whole. In other parts of Florida, it creates massively deep underground caverns and springs that attract us humans looking for some swimming hole fun. In the Everglades, it forms solution holes like the one in the photo above (remember earlier in the tour we talked about oolitic limestone?). We should note we did not see any forms of life in the water. We should also note that much of Florida's drinking water comes from two karst aquifers, the Floridan and the Biscayne.
NEXT STOP: Dry Season/Wet Season
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Pretty much the entire Florida Peninsula sits atop a bed of limestone rock. Limestone is basically calcium carbonate; mix it with acidic water, it will react in various ways and form what geologists call karst topography. In parts of Florida, karst is responsible for sinkholes that can swallow a house whole. In other parts of Florida, it creates massively deep underground caverns and springs that attract us humans looking for some swimming hole fun. In the Everglades, it forms solution holes like the one in the photo above (remember earlier in the tour we talked about oolitic limestone?). We should note we did not see any forms of life in the water. We should also note that much of Florida's drinking water comes from two karst aquifers, the Floridan and the Biscayne.
NEXT STOP: Dry Season/Wet Season
RETURN TO THE TOUR PAGE —||— RETURN TO THE MAIN PAGE