SEA TURTLES
TBD
25
FLInfoGuide.com
• Sea turtle nesting season is May to end of October!
• Three species of sea turtles nest along Florida’s coast.
The loggerhead mostly nests on our local beaches.
• Large air-breathing reptile’s shell is reddish-brown &
has a big block-like head
• Streamlined shell helps them glide effortlessly
through water
• Females dig a large hole in the sand above the high
tide line using her strong flippers
• Females lay 40 to 100 ping pong ball-sized eggs
• Once the eggs hatch, babies brave their way through
predators (crabs, large fish & even humans) to begin
their life at sea
• Less likely to be hunted for their meat or shell
compared to other sea turtles
Source: tampabaywatch.org
Source: City of St. Petersburg & Dept. of State, 1976
Within a decade after the famous Wright Brothers’ 1903 fl ight, aviation history was being made in Florida. The
fi rst transcontinental fl ight landed at Jacksonville in 1912, a naval air training center opened at Pensacola
in 1913 & the St. Petersburg-Tampa Airboat Line, the world’s fi rst regularly scheduled commercial airline,
began service in 1914. Tom Benoist, a pioneer airboat (seaplane) manufacturer from St. Louis, started this
cargo & passenger airline as well as a fl ying school on Tampa Bay. Backed by members of the St. Petersburg
Board of Trade, he built hangars on the north edge of the yacht basin.
Anthony “Tony” Jannus, Benoist’s head pilot, took the airline’s fi rst passenger, former mayor A.C. Pheil,
across the bay in a biplane on January 1, 1914. The twenty mile maiden fl ight of the new service took
twenty-three minutes to complete. Days later, a light cargo was for the fi rst time, fl own across the bay. The
activities of this airline demonstrated that air travel was practical. Services were discontinued after only a
few months due to fi nancial & technical diffi culties.
FIRST SCHEDULED COMMERCIAL FLIGHT