How Lionfish, Green Iguanas, and Burmese Pythons Are Hurting the South Florida Ecosystem

Introduction

A relatively unique characteristic based on history, geography, and climate, and other environmental factors; have composed the ecosystem of South Florida critical storage of nature inform of a landscape, water bodies, and diversity of both plant and animal species. The fauna of these areas of Florida is quite dynamic (Aronson and Szejko, 2010). Three elements mostly describe the nature of biodiversity in southern Florida, is composed of the following: the terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems; peninsula region and variety of habitat; and dry climate. South Florida has subtropical and humid weather with moderate yearly temperatures of about 70s F-80 F during summer. And also, has a relatively high rainfall that occasionally takes place in late summer and early fall; and thus may accompany tropical storms or hurricanes. There is a design of decreased concentration of species down through Florida.

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Decreased number of species and stressful circumstances are never equally expressed in all ecological segments; however, there are over 30 species of native mammals in Florida's mainland southern part of Lake Okeechobee (Gamazo, 2013). And Carnivores seems to compose a more significant percentage of the mammalian fauna in south Florida. Moreover, 300 bird species are also found in South Florida; and therefore, over 60% are those that migrate from time to time. Again, over 130 various species of reptiles and amphibians are identified in Florida with approximately 70 species specifically from South Florida; and there are over 92 fish species in the fresh water of south Florida (Ferriter et al., 2001).

The Rise of the Green Iguana, Burmese Python, and Lionfish

The invasive exotic herpes to faunal species condition in Florida tend to be relatively extreme, and the invasion of exotic reptile in Florida which seems to deserve extensive control. An effort has been applied in trying to decrease the rising figures of introductions, with some recommendable success prevention in practical and economical ways to eradicate invasive species. Nonetheless, the presence of excess established exotic reptiles seems to merit management action in the south Florida ecosystem (Makowski and Finkl, 2019). The reptiles that are invasive in Florida show novel species to be regarded for elimination or protection. Even though not featured as an elimination attempts, the black spiny-tailed iguanas tend to indicate the initial intensive control measures for the invasive reptile in Florida; and therefore, several agencies and research institutions have currently carried out some research into several approaches of development for regulating and controlling Burmese pythons.

There is an emphasis on studying the background and life history of an invasive species in trying to comprehend why it is or is not active, and what its weakness might be. Such information gives expectation regarding its inversion and colonization in other types of habitats or areas; and also attempting to test the kinds of biological features linked with invasive species that colonize the space. The determination of various weaknesses, which can be used for management, is limited by others that identify the essence of findings which directly helps in the deletion of such invasive kinds of animals and reptiles. A fast reaction to a newly recognized foundation of different reptiles may be identified as quite practical, feasible, and crucial to eliminate prior to becoming wide-spread across a broad range. Such control measures have been currently conducted on the Northern African python sebae, and thus founded a small population in Miami-Dade County which seemed to be the primary focus of intensive survey work.

However, to attain such results, effective control approaches have to be availed and created based on reptiles; and then used in a sustained and systematic integrated pest management project. Other characteristics effects are possessing attainable policies and processes in a situation that effectively prevent the accidental or intentional acceptance of exotic species into Florida's ecosystem. According to the zoologists, they suggested that most reptiles are substantially affected by environmental factors such as various temperatures; and therefore impacting their distribution pattern and density. Generally, most reptiles tend to regulate the temperature of their bodies in behavioral and physiological ways, and thus controlling the temperature deters their survival. It should be noted that the minimum activity temperature is critical in the distribution of reptiles than their maximal heat control and tolerance (Fortwangler, 2013). The climate matching has regularly used the approach for approximating the geographical demerits, and the potential risk of an invading species relies on where they are identified in their original geographic scope. Nonetheless, there is an insufficiency of standardized procedure to ensure the identification of variables used in a climate analysis will give a relatively valid and reliable reflection of where the invading species is likely expanding its scope. This purpose statement of this particular paper is attempting to find out the invasive disaster facing the south Florida ecosystem due to the uncontrolled rise of the Green Iguana, Burmese Python, and Lionfish.

Burmese Pythons

Burmese python has recently dramatically been one of the highest profile reptiles of the most invasive reptiles in South Florida. It is relatively big and may be more than 5 m, and the range of their prey has received considerable focus from the media. For instance, the media gave the remainder of an estimated 1.7-m alligator showing from the belly of a Burmese python of approximated length of 4 to 5 meters, this even made many zoologists hypothesize that the python could invade almost a third of the southern part of the U.S. And the specific snake species has been breeding in the wild in south Florida for more than 30 years; thus causing further invasion pathway in south Florida. Therefore, the python possesses a lot of risk to the ecosystem since it is likely not to sustain and maintain the ecosystem due to its excessive divested feeding chain and overproduction ability, and thus hurting the South Florida Ecosystem (Perez, 2012).

However, Acetaminophen seems to be toxic to brown tree snakes and is being applied for their control in Guam following tests is also assumed that acetaminophen is toxic to Burmese pythons, in addition, the preference tests for bait matrices indicated that juvenile pythons preferred natural preys; therefore, environmentalist and the Florida conservation management tries to apply such test to assist in sustaining the ecosystem from the threat of the Burmese Python from hurting its ecosystem through their inversion. In South Florida, the placement of bait would demand to be specific to Burmese pythons so as to prevent hurting non-target species within the ecosystem (Snow et al., 2001). The essence of the python's unique characteristics such as size, dietary potential, and mobility could be applied to make bait delivery particular to the pythons. Moreover, the Multi-capture traps and trap-drift fence together are built, designed and examined for trapping pythons as a strategy of their control and protection of the ecosystem and human population around the southern part of Florida. Nevertheless, more formulation and advancements of tools and strategies are still required to innovate a relatively more efficient control program for Burmese pythons in order to prevent the ecosystem from hurt due to its inversion and ensure the sustainability of the system.

Green Iguanas

Many species of exotic iguanine lizards are found within the southern part of Florida, with the green iguana being frequent regarding human and wildlife violence. The green iguana tends to cover a relatively much broader geographic scope in Florida is a significant concern to an intensive control program. Green iguanas are a successful and tactful colonizing species in Florida as examined both by its ubiquity and geographic scale and seems to be everywhere in South Florida. Nonetheless, extreme weather like a cold spell may only make the Greene Guana to experience contraction thus resulting in Green Guan's population density to be severe and in turn, staining the ecosystem even in a relatively controlled region.

The Biotic potential, deterring elements, and colonization procedure of the green iguana in Florida have researched on by several scientists, but the findings from the survey have not been adequately explained and disseminated to be well understood. Again, the ecological effect of the green iguana in South Florida is not clearly illustrated. The green iguana has a dramatic reproductive ability, with a single clutch comprising of over 12-88 eggs. The black spiny-tailed iguana densely populates the terrestrial habitats of the island, including all residential and most economic areas; and thus putting a lot of strains on the South Florida ecological system and need to be controlled to realize sustainability.

And the iguanas had significantly affected much property by the destruction they cause to landscape plants and homesteads. Due to such losses, and the neighborhood residents had even decided to contribute toward the control programs of the Iguana species within the locality since it had started hurting the ecosystem as well. The main focus with this species is its ability to expand at a faster rate, and its predations on other relatively small-bodied lizards because they seem to have a lot to feed on. Due to its feeding pattern, Green Iguana tends to alter the intended ecosystem food chain thus compromising the sustainability of nature. If the animal is not adequately controlled and manages, it may end up posing permanent damage to the South Florida ecosystem and its surrounding; and again, may make some of the species within the wild to go extinct.

Lionfish

Invasive lionfish have indicated to be exclusive predators upon different other aquatic animals and fish. And Juvenile lionfish seems to rely on crustacean as food; however, if invasive lionfish end up depleting their preferred prey base, then they may turn to feed on the young ones which happen to be of economic value (Whitfield et al. 2001). Moreover, the reduction in the number of the juvenile species can compromise the coral reefs since the algae will not be adequately controlled resulting in the minimization of the survival rate of corals. The complete alteration of the feeding pattern due to invasion tends to hurt the ecosystem of South Florida.

Lionfish larvae tend to have a dramatic extreme birth rate to favorable habitat, indicating that there is a high probability that their most of their eggs end up into larvae, and ultimately become juvenile lionfish settled in a relatively favorable environment in which they can mature and live freely from various environmental pressures. Lionfish have the capability of eating even the prey over half the size of their own body when it can fit into their mouths, and their stomach is extremely elastic and can enlarge up to 30 times the average volume, and a lionfish will always have the urge to fill up to capacity when it is in access of their prey. Moreover, Lionfish have a tendency of feeding indiscriminately (Valdivia et al., 2014). According to Scientists, have classified over 70 different species that lionfish will eat via stomach content analysis and illustrated that a single lionfish could decrease native aquatic living things by 70% - 95% in its scope within the 35 days. Due to such unique feeding characteristics, lionfish have significantly compromised the sustainability and maintenance of...