Page 78 - LIN March-2023 50-84-sent

Enjoy

March Events
at Rookery Bay

• Lunch Lectures
• Watercolor Classes
• Photography Classes
• Birding Workshops
• Aquariums
• Touch Tank
• Exhibits
• Art Gallery
• Walking Trails
• Gift Shop
The 14
th
Annual Bash
for the Bay on March 9
at The Players Club & Spa
at Lely features live music,
cocktails, dinner, auctions Rookery Bay
and dancing.
Proceeds benefit education,
fights fire with fire
research and conservation.

popular 1970s television commercial and rodents such as field mice, which birds of prey find easier
A to spot in the newly-burned ground. Rookery Bay uses drone
said, “It’s not nice to fool Mother
technology to see the effects of a burn in real-time and shortly
Nature.” But for staff at the Rookery
Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve thereafter.
in Naples, it’s okay to give nature a helping Greg Curry, a long-time Resource Management Specialist at
hand by mimicking its work. Rookery Bay and “Burn Boss,” recommends a regular schedule of
Ten members of the reserve’s fire team – habitats to be burned each year. He uses science to track when an
assisted by a dozen partnering organizations – conduct prescribed area was last burned, how much “fuel” currently exists, the optimal
fires, or controlled burns, primarily from late fall through early weather conditions for that location, and the safety goals.
spring when conditions are just right. Rookery Bay might wait anywhere from three to eight years
They have burned thousands of acres over the past 25 years, before setting a fire in the same location. Scrub forests, pine
focusing on areas of the reserve that are closest to residential flatwood forests and tropical hardwood hammock forests all burn
communities such as Artesia, Treviso Bay and Isles of Collier and regenerate differently. The team even sets fires on islands
Preserve. within its 110,000 acres.
Setting controlled fires is important to reduce the “fuel load,” By focusing on prescribed fires that are safe and effective,
or amount of dead plant material that would quickly escalate into Rookery Bay reduces the likelihood of wildfires and helps Mother
a wildfire that might be caused by something like a lightning Nature stay resilient.
strike. Rookery Bay thanks its partners in the prescribed fire program:
Fires also help with the control and eradication of invasive Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Florida Forest
and exotic plant species, including Brazilian pepper, melaleuca, Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife, Marco Island and Naples fire districts,
Old World climbing fern and Cogon grass. Collier-Seminole State Park, Florida Panther and Ten Thousand
In addition, fires generate nutrients that are returned to the Islands National Wildlife Refuges, Big Cypress National Park,
soil and help trees, plants and wildflowers grow healthier. Within Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park, Picayune Strand State Forest,
days, herbaceous grasses sprout up and then flowers, attracting Naples Botanical Garden, Conservation Collier, and Koreshan State
gopher tortoises, deer, turkeys, bears, insects such as bees, rabbits, Park.

Rookery Bay Environmental Learning Center
300 Tower Road, Naples, Florida Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. 239-530-5972 www.rookerybay.org

78 Life in Naples | March 2023