Florida's Water-Related Native Plants

The native plants that grow in and around Florida's freshwater and saltwater ecosystems aren't just pretty scenery — they are the ecosystem, and without them the whole food web collapses. Florida has over 4,000 native plant species, more than almost any other state in the continental US thanks to our tropical climate. Aquatic native plants provide spawning beds and nursery habitat for virtually every fish species in Florida's freshwater and coastal systems. Native aquatic plants absorb nitrogen and phosphorus — the same nutrients that cause toxic algae blooms — directly from the water column, acting as a natural water filter. And Florida's freshwater wetland plants store enormous amounts of carbon; draining or destroying them releases that carbon as CO₂ and accelerates climate change. In this lesson, we'll go deep on emergent aquatic plants, floating and submerged plants, saltmarsh and tidal shoreline plants, invasive aquatic plants, shoreline buffer plants, seagrass, and what you can do to help.