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No less than a dozen Florida panther kittens have entered the world in recent weeks, according to a recent release from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
But will that good news slow environmentalist efforts to force millions of acres off the table through the courts?
Four dens with three kittens each have been found so far this year in Picayune Strand State Forest and Big Cypress National Preserve in Collier County. Panthers breed throughout the year, but most offspring are produced in the spring.
Once down to about 30 cats in the '80s, the panther — with the help of breeding by mountain lions from western states — had grown to close to 120 by some estimates. Last year, after 17 reported deaths from traffic incidents and territorial fights, the numbers dropped to roughly 100.
Now, nature has found a way to help even the numbers out a bit. Coffee Talk would like to think, and suggests that in this day and age, 12% growth in almost anything is good news.
What appears now to have only been a temporary decline in the numbers, led in large part to a consortium of environmental groups filing a lawsuit in February against the federal Environmental Protection Agency. That suit seeks to force the designation of 3.1 million acres of Southwest Florida as critical habitat for the Florida panther. (See “One Big Litter Box” in the March 5, 2010 Business Review.)
Much of that land is in Collier, Lee and Hendry Counties, including 1.1 million acres in private ownership. As such, based on studies of other critical habitat designations, the lawsuit could end up costing the Southwest Florida economy tens of billions of dollars and thousands of jobs.
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