Rookery Bay Volunteer Orlando Hidalgo recently captured special moments of a bald eagle mother caring for her juvenile in the nest and in flight. The young eagle was observed being fed and preened by its parent and later shadowing her in the air to learn hunting and survival skills.  Juvenile bald eagles look dramatically different from the iconic white-headed adults.

Rookery Bay’s popular Lunch & Learn series continued its successful streak last week. The Environmental Learning Center auditorium was a full house for “Living with Bears in Southwest Florida.” This second program in the 2026 Birds, Bears and Bees series featured Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) Bear Biologist Chris Boyce.

Lake Jackson Aquatic Preserve participated in the Tall Timbers Red Hills Fire and Nature Festival, where locals and visitors enjoyed the outdoors, learned about the benefits of prescribed fire for native wildlife and watched a live burn demonstration. 

Attending with us this year were some of our invertebrate friends collected from Lake Jackson's waters.

The Central Florida Aquatic Preserve (CFAP) team recently installed the Living Waters collection in the Lyonia Environmental Center gallery, in Deltona, Fl.

The GTMNERR (GTM Research Reserve) celebrated National Estuaries Week with two events hosted by the Friends of GTM Research Reserve. On Friday, September 26, 2025, the reserve came alive with an evening of oysters, a low country boil, music and an estuary celebration.

On Saturday, Sept. 6, 2025, GTM Research Reserve attended the Cub Scout Pack 277 “Back to Pack” event, held at Christ Church in Ponte Vedra Beach. The purpose of the event was to get Cub Scouts excited about scouting in the upcoming year. Outreach Specialist Kristine Seager introduced the group to Princess Diana, a diamondback terrapin (Malaclemys terrapin) turtle, one of the reserve’s animal ambassadors.

Griffin Alexander, Stephanie Stinson, and Mackenzie Magyar represented DEP’s Southeast Region at ICAST 2025, the world’s largest sportfishing tradeshow, in Orlando last week. The team especially enjoyed conversing with fishing stakeholders from across the country (and world) at the event, sharing information on Florida's magnificent State Parks and Aquatic Preserves.