Nature surprises on Virginia Key

Photo credit: Sam Wright. Okenia  hypogaea is a new variety of each peanut  discovered by Wendy Teas, Sea Turtle Stranding Coordinator for the National Marine Fisheries Service in the maritime tropical hammock of Virginia Key. This variety has pink pigment on the stems and leaf, a color that has never been observed before now.

Aerial view of Virginia Key shows Tropical Hammock and dunes alongside Bear Cut that is part of the Historic Virginia Key Beach Park.

Newly vegetated dunes are part of a federally funded ecological restoration project.

There are some who would chafe at the notion that Virginia Key is, at its core, a wilderness. If there’s a restaurant there, or for that matter, a Water and Sewage Treatment Plant, how can it be a wilderness?

But even within and certainly around the man-made structures and uses, wilderness prevails and perseveres. And often surprises.

The discovery of a new variety of beach peanut is such a surprise. The separate population of Okenia hypogaea was discovered by Wendy Teas, Sea Turtle Stranding Coordinator for the National Marine Fisheries Service in the maritime tropical hammock of Virginia Key. This variety has pink pigment on the stems and leaf, a color that has never been observed before now.

The maritime hammock of Virginia Key is just one small part of a web of wild places. Other habitats of Virginia Key include a beach dune, coastal strand, and mangrove tidal swamp.

Reclaiming and restoring disturbed natural areas has allowed new species never before seen on Virginia Key to return to their ancestral habitats.

Former Fairchild Tropical Garden Conservation intern Allison Rosenberg documented the presence of a new population of beach star (Cyperus pedunculatus). And beach clustervine (Jacquemontia reclinata) has been introduced along the dune habitat.

Wilderness certainly can be defined as the most undisturbed, pristine, free of human contact places left on the planet. But it can also be found closer to home, in the swaths of wildness on a barrier island that appears to be reclaiming itself.



Download the guidebook to the Tropical Hammock of Virginia Key:
http://www.virginiakeybeachpark.net/guidebook.pdf