WEST PALM BEACH — The South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) has allocated $584,000 to build facilities, capture wild Cape Sable Seaside Sparrows (CSSS) and start a captive breeding program.
That investment is needed in order to operate billions of dollars’ worth of infrastructure already built or in progress, SFWMD Division Director for Ecosystem Restoration Jennifer Reynolds explained at the Dec. 12 meeting of the SFWMD Governing Board.
Reynolds said the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has awarded the contract for the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA) Reservoir -- the largest construction contract the USACE Jacksonville District has ever awarded. The reservoir, which will be complete in 2034, will accept water from Lake Okeechobee in the wet season and release it south to the Everglades in the dry season.
“Florida Department of Transportation is continuing work to uncork the flow under the Tamiami Trail,” said Reynolds. This $57 million project projected to be complete in Spring 2026. Removing portions of levees will reconnect the flow way to Shark River Slough.
Currently, flow under the Tamiami Trail is restricted nine months of the year to project the nesting area of a subpopulation of the CSSS.
“For decades the CSSS has been a challenge and a hurdle to moving water south,” said Reynolds. “The only tool we’ve had to help conserve the sparrow has been changing operations, regulating operations, throttling back on moving water south to protect the habitat.”
She said the CSSS population continues to decline. In 2024 survey of CSSS population, the numbers were the lowest survey numbers on record. The total CSSS population is estimated at 2,176 birds– a 14% decline since last year. No CSSS were found in the "subpopulation A" area.
That puts US Fish and Wildlife Service in a critical spot, said Reynolds.
Two subcommittees working on conservation for CSSS are looking at multiple approaches.
One is looking at marl prairie – looking across the Everglades and across Florida and identifying areas CSSS could live long term. The other committee is looking at options like captive breeding so CSSS populations can be established in places it can thrive.