Conservation

There are more than 100 specialty license plates in Florida. The second most popular is providing a big help for sea turtles.

For the first time since 2015, Florida will reopen black bear hunting.

Biologists have shown that an attempt at genetic rescue for the Florida panther 30 years ago has been a success.

A week after Gov. Ron DeSantis vetoed the project, the Santa Rosa County Commission has worked out a plan for raising the money to buying for conservation 27 acres of land on Santa Rosa Sound.

This is becoming the deadliest year since 2016. More than one out of every 10 known panthers have been killed this year — with most trying to cross highways.

The recently announced protection of over 400 acres in Santa Rosa County is helping to provide more buffer for NAS Whiting Field and create more nature-based outdoor recreation opportunities.

Dr. Jamie Rotenberg will talk about his research at the Sarasota Audubon Society's Meet and Greet on March 19 at Celery Fields.

Although federal wildlife officials protected areas where bonneted bats currently live, conservation advocates say protections need to go further to include locations the bats will eventually migrate to due to sea-level rise.

The death of a sperm whale off the Venice coast this morning, while difficult even for marine experts who deal with such things, could be a learning experience for them. "Every time you see a whale in distress, like we did yesterday, it's, it's always really hard. It's really hard. And so all we can do is utilize the opportunity to learn as much about them as we can," Laura Engleby, chief of NOAA's Marine Mammal branch, said Monday morning standing on the beach near the whale's carcass. "And then that helps us understand some of the things that we can do to ultimately recover and help them. And so, in that way, that's how we have to think about it. "

Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Florida Cabinet on Tuesday approved spending $19 million to conserve rural land used for cattle, while also expanding a list of agricultural properties the state could help shield from residential or commercial development.