Miccosukee Tribal elder Michael Frank speaks to members of a task force that brings together federal, state, tribal and local agencies working to restore and protect the Florida Everglades, on a field visit to the Miccosukee Indian Reservation ahead of a task force meeting hosted by the Miccosukee Tribe, Wednesday, April 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell) Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS Share BY ASSOCIATED PRESS EVERGLADES, Fla. (AP) — As a boy, when the water was low Talbert Cypress from the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida rummaged through the Everglades’ forests, swam in its swampy ponds and fished in its canals. But the vast wetlands near Miami have radically changed since Cypress was younger. Now 42 and tribal council chairman, Cypress said water levels are among the biggest changes. Droughts are drier and longer. Prolonged floods are drowning tree islands sacred to them. Native wildlife have dwindled. “It’s basically extremes now,” he said. Tribal elder Michael John Frank put it this way: “The Everglades is beautiful, but it’s just a skeleton of the way it used to be.” ______ EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of a series of on how tribes and Indigenous communities are coping with and combating climate change. ______ For centuries, the Everglades has been the tribe’s home. But decades of massive engineering projects for development and agriculture severed the wetlands to about half its original size, devastating an ecosystem that’s sustained them. Tribe members say water mismanagement has contributed to fires, floods and water pollution in their communities and cultural sites. Climate change, and the fossil fuel activities that caused it, are ongoing threats. The Miccosukee people have long fought to heal and protect what remains. They were historically reluctant to engage with the outside world due to America’s violent legacy against Indigenous people. But with […]