In a land of water, we’re running on empty!
- 2 hours ago
- 4 min read
February 13, 2026
South Florida is known as the land of sunshine and water. Pristine beaches, tranquil rivers, and marshlands all rely on a seasonal drumbeat of thunderstorms in the wet season and long silent dry seasons. But this year has brought an exceptionally long quiet period. With no rain, our normally water-soaked system is parched, and when this happens, everybody feels the strain.
This month, various South Florida municipalities, including the counties of Miami-Dade, Monroe, Lee and Collier, have announced water restrictions due to this prolonged drought. Residents are being asked to limit lawn irrigation and reduce overall water use as water levels in our aquifers and water conservation areas drop to concerning levels. These restrictions are a reminder that even in a region defined by water, our supply is not unlimited. Everglades restoration is designed to address exactly this challenge, by building reservoirs and natural storage areas that allow us to capture water during wet years and hold it for times like these, when the rains don’t come.
The Everglades: Nature’s Water Bank
Most years, Florida’s seasons and natural system work together like lungs in the human body. Historically, in the wet season, the Everglades ‘breathes in’ and stores an abundance of water. In the dry season, that water would gently flow out of storage in large lakes, through tributaries, to the flat open expanse of the Everglades.
Unfortunately, due to human intervention, the lungs of this system aren’t as healthy as they used to be – so they don’t store as much water. This lack of storage means that the Everglades is more dependent than ever on that regular pulse of the wet and dry seasons working together.
When the wet season is delayed, and there isn’t enough storage to provide flow through the system, the land dries out, fires are more frequent, and water supply shortages for the cities that are dependent on the Everglades are necessary.
When the Rains Don’t Come
Historically, the wet season starts in mid-May and continues through October, delivering about 70% of the region’s annual rainfall through afternoon thunderstorms and occasional hurricanes. In recent years, the onset and intensity of the wet season has become less predictable. The result is a system that is less stable, more likely to experience extreme flooding and drought. This year, South Florida is already showing deficits in rainfall and areas of extreme drought on the landscape. The short-term precipitation outlook tells us these conditions aren’t likely to improve in the next few months.
Impacts of a Drought
Water Supply: The porous landscape of South Florida connects the Everglades to our freshwater aquifer. During the current drought, water levels in that aquifer are already lower than desired (reaching critical levels), leading to the current water restrictions and increasing the extent of saltwater intrusion. Given the lack of sufficient storage in the Everglades ecosystem today, there is little that can be done to protect our water supply other than to reduce water use and wait until rain returns.
Fires: Prolonged drought increases the risk of fires and all but guarantees that, should a fire occur, it will be more intense and burn deep into the rich soils of the Everglades. This year water levels in Everglades National Park are more than ½ a foot lower than last year and over a foot lower than the year before that.Given these extreme conditions, even a single intense fire could literally reduce land elevation, exacerbating the challenge of living in a remarkably flat landscape while combating sea level rise.
As astounding as this may sound – drought can lead to fire and loss of soils, paradoxically increasing risk of flooding.
Hypersalinity: Florida Bay and southern Biscayne Bay historically were estuaries, where significant freshwater flow into a salty bay created extensive transition zones of low salinity waters. As this year’s drought persists, salinity in Florida Bay in particular is climbing. In the most recent prolonged drought, some areas of the bay became hypersaline, with salt content reaching twice that of the open ocean.
Hypersalinity is stressful to seagrass and marine animals, sometimes leading to significant die-off events where the bay’s clear waters are replaced with the sight of dead seagrass and fish. Everglades restoration depends on the freshwater reservoirs we’ve built and those still to come, so water can keep flowing during dry times—otherwise, we’re simply waiting and hoping for rain.
The Solution: Storing Water
Wetlands have always been nature’s water bank—holding wet-season abundance and releasing it in times of scarcity. But, today only about half of the Everglades remain. Everglades restoration projects including the EAA Reservoir are on an accelerated timeline, moving quickly to recreate the water storage that has been lost from this system. Storage features, combined with stormwater treatment areas to improve water quality, are one way that restoration activities can help bridge the gap between wet seasons, providing dry season flow in times of need. Water storage isn’t just for the natural system, it also helps to replenish the Biscayne Aquifer, the source of freshwater for the people of South Florida, and protect it from saltwater intrusion.
Restoration for Resilience
The hallmark of resilience is a system's ability to spring back from disturbance, like overcoming a drought by delivering stored water across the system.Restoration features are being built to reproduce lost characteristics of a strong resilient Everglades, providing the right amount of water, at the right places and at the right times. The drought we are experiencing will certainly test this system. Through continued restoration efforts, we aim to pass this test and those to come.
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