Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

Stone Crab Season Ends Today: Six Places Offering Last Call For Claws

The 2012-2013 stone crab season closes tomorrow, May 16, with the last day of harvest today. According to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, traps must be removed from the water within five days. All restaurateurs and stores must obtain their stone crabs by May 16. It's been a ... More >>

PETA Demands Python Hunters Stop Decapitating Snakes

Experts around the country have raised all kinds of concerns about Florida's mass orgy of python killing set for this weekend. Would-be snake hunters only have to read a couple of PDFs to qualify, leaving them in grave danger of death by dehydration, snake bite, swamp rot and god knows what other Ev ... More >>

Hundreds of Maniacs Sign Up To Hunt Pythons in the Everglades This Weekend

Does slogging around a foreboding, swampy wilderness searching for man-hungry pythons that can grow longer than a city block sound like your idea of a fun weekend? For hundreds of people from around the country, the answer is a resounding yes.More than 400 souls who have apparently never seen cinema ... More >>

Florida is Hosting a Python Hunting Contest: $1,000 for the Longest Snake

Invasive pythons continue to reek havoc through out Florida's swampy ecosystems, and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has come up with a novel way to help control the population: a hunting contest. Yes, the FWC is offering prize money for the most pythons bagged overal ... More >>

Alligator Pool Parties Shut Down By State Authorities

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has decided to be a party pooper. They've pulled the plug on those "alligators swimming with kids" pool parties that so captivated us, hence killing an important part of Florida culture and tradition that never got a chance to properly flourish.

Urban Sprawl Kills Endangered Florida Panthers: 2012 Could Be Deadliest Year Yet

Stand-Up Paddleboarders Will Get Ticketed for Not Wearing Life Jackets

Sup, bro? You totally into that crazy SUPing? You know, that stand-up paddleboarding? Well, the Conservation Commission Marine Patrol is about to cramp your style and issue a ticket if you decide to SUP in certain areas without a life jacket.

Coral Reefs Are Being Decimated, All for a Few Gaudy Trinkets

Adobo Wild Boar, Lionfish Tacos, and Snakehead Stew: Five Edible South Florida Invasive Species

​Florida Agriculture commissioner Adam Putnam went on television this past weekend to warn that the giant African land snail can carry meningitis. If you eat it, that is. Who in hell would consider eating a slimy snail the size of a Chihuahua? Plenty of people, it turns out.The snail grows up to e ... More >>

Here's a List of 3,125 County Employees Who Made Six Figures This Year

Has Carlos Gimenez changed Carlos Alvarez's big-spendin' ways?​Let's take a moment to remember back to the distant past. Cue the theremins. The time: Last November. The place: Miami-Dade. The conflict: County residents enraged over the economic free fall are close to recalling Mayor Carlos Alvarez ... More >>

Birthday Cake Eating Bear Terrorizing North Florida

​Bears, we will let you get away with a lot. You can paw through our trash. You can sneak into our yards. But when you come into our houses and steal our delicious, frosted, high fat birthday cakes you've simply crossed a line, and it means only one thing: death. 

Cops raid Jimbo's over fishy business

Jimbo's Raided for Unlicensed (But Delicious) Fish

​Jimbo's -- the venerable Virginia Key hobo den, petting zoo, and bocce pit -- was recently named one of Esquire's best bars in America. It looks like a Mad Max gang hangout. In a figurative sense, the smoked fish sold there is like an enema. Some people swear by it. The more squeamish, however, ... More >>

300-Pound Eagle Ray Traps Woman After Jumping on Boat

​The celluloid tails of giant sharks jumping on to boats and devouring everything in sight may be works of fiction from movies like Jaws. But occasionally a giant underseas dweller making their presence known above the water line happens. This weekend in the Florida Keys, just off Islamorada, a wo ... More >>

Have Some Extra Exotic Animals Around Your House? Give Them to Zoo Miami on March 12th

​Riptide recently moved, and as with every move came a long hard look at our possessions: what were we taking with, what was being donated somewhere, and what was to be shown the dumpster. Of course, as we understand is normal, we stressed over what to do with our vast private collection of exotic ... More >>

Motorcycles Collide with Big Rig, Helicopter Comes to the Rescue on Krome Avenue

via CBS4​An accident straight out of a Michael Bay movie has temporarily shut down a portion of Krome Avenue in both directions. At least three motorcycles collided with a tractor trailer. Luckily, a nearby helicopter landed near the scene, and a man jumped out of the chopper to administer CPR to ... More >>

Propeller Seriously Cuts Boy's Arm at Black Point Marina

Horrific boating accident at Blackpoint Marina on June 3​A 12-year old boy was still in critical condition Thursday night after a horrific boating accident at Black Point Marina in South Miami-Dade County nearly cost him his arm. Channel 10 identified the boy as Parker Brannon and said he wa ... More >>

Wildlife Cops Bust Man Selling Pythons on Craigslist

Bethany Berg Via Flicker CCThe ad on Craigslist Miami shows a photo of two large black snakes slithering on white carpet. "Ball Pythons for Cheap," the headline reads. "They are very tame and eat one mouse a week." Scroll down a bit and find a "dwarf pastel Colombian redtail boa" for $160. A bit f ... More >>

Cuban immigrant caught illegally trapping birds in Homestead thinks strict animal rules are for the birds

Trapping Migratory Birds is Illegal, Cuban Immigrant Learns

Adrian Acosta Gonzalez Via the Miami-Dade Police Department​Not far from Miami International Airport, there's a little pink house where one man lives with 24 pigeons. Adrian Acosta-Gonzalez is a 37-year-old, Cuban-born landscaper with bronze skin and good bone structure. He slides open a bi ... More >>

Reptiles of Concern: Let's Go Out and Shoot Giant Snakes!

As God as our witness, Florida will not rest until we put a bullet between the eyes of every alien python, anaconda, and monitor lizard in this state. They have taken our pets, they have taken our Everglades, they have taken our alligators, they have even taken our children, and this means war.The F ... More >>

Hialeah Seafood Smuggler: What Kind of Guy Drives Around With 232 Lobster Tails?

Esox Lucius via Flicker CCOk, so you're cruising north on the Florida Turnpike. The cops pull you over and you're freaking out, man, because you're holding some seriously illicit shit: A cooler full of 232 lobster tails -- 167 of which are undersized. Undersized! Alberto Varea, age 54, of Hialeah ... More >>

Miami Gardens residents claim suspicious man swiped their ducks

Duck Soup? That Fowl on Your Plate Might Have Been Napped

toshio via flickr cc​Mary, a straight-talking senior citizen, is the kind of woman who would jump in front of a car to save a family of ducklings. So you can imagine the sense of horror when -- lying in bed one night -- she heard the sound of a mother duck in pain. She snuck outside to investigate ... More >>

Hunters Push to Legalize Fishing Once-Endangered Goliath Grouper

scuba diver via flicker cc​Shhhhhhhh. Listen to that. It's the sound of hundreds of feisty, cow-size fish making sweet, sweet love. Early October is the height of spawning season for goliath grouper, which means the rare floating horndogs are getting busy in Miami waters as we speak. In early fall ... More >>

Scientists Worried Everglades Pythons Could Morph into Hybrid Man-Eating Monsters

Last week, I wrote about a coalition of scientists trying to stop the next dangerous exotic invader from taking over the Everglades. via Wikimedia CommonsAt this point, it's probably just best to run and scream.​Dennis Giardina, a botanist who co-chairs the group, took me on a hunt for nile monito ... More >>

Glades Invaders

It's too late to stop the pythons. The real question is, what's next?

Seventeen-Foot Python Caught in Okeechobee

via Florida Fish & Wildlife​ Here's the giant snake that's on the front page of every local news website, so why not ours too? Slow news day. As part of the insane/awesome new government initiative to kill every Burmese python in the wild, this 17-footer was caught yesterda ... More >>

Bill Nelson Proposes a Giant Python-Killing Party in the Everglades

In certain times and places in U.S. history, the answer to every political problem was probably "Let's get a bunch of guys with guns together and solve this." Nowadays, this idea seems to be seriously considered only in matters of Middle East diplomacy, but Florida Sen. Bill Nelson is suggesting a ... More >>

Swamped

Saving the Glades could mean screwing these guys.

Feds Bust Yacht Pimped Out With Endangered Animal Hides, Tusks

Listen up, foreign billionaires who enjoy pimping out your pleasure yachts with the finest in endangered African animal skins: You might want to keep that luxury boat away from Florida.You won't find Acosta's pad decorated like this, apparently.Surrounded by stuffed lions, mounted, roaring tiger hea ... More >>

Ship Wrecked

Boat owners drowning in the economy are sinking their ships by the dozens. We're all paying the price.

Memo to Hog Hunters: Don't Hunt While Sick (Not That You Would)

Words such as "Public Health Emergency" and "Global Pandemic" can awaken the dormant hypochondriac in the best of us. So when newspapers started using scary words to describe the swine flu yesterday, it occurred to Riptide that Florida has the second biggest wild hog population in the country. And t ... More >>

As Economy Sinks, Boat Owners Abandon Ship Around Miami -- And We Pick Up the Tab

The rusted prow of a 35-foot boat juts out of the water's edge in Maul Lake, a placid pool just a stone's throw from US-1 and 163rd Street. Its cabin windows are shattered, its hull is tangled with reeds and its roof is streaked with lime green spray paint.via Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation ... More >>

Letters from the Issue of March 5, 2009

"Let him foolishly make money off of these animals, and we'll mop up the mess when something tragic finally happens."

Croc Problem To Be Solved With A Role of Tape and Some Magnets

crocodile magnet via Great Russian GiftsThe Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has come up with a interesting plan to keep Crocodiles out of the waters behind residential communities. They'll be taping magnets to their head. By attaching magnets to each side of their heads some resear ... More >>

Hog Huntin' in the Glades

A lost art or a horrible slaughter? It's all in the eye of the hunter.

The Iguana Huntress

Tired of those pesky reptiles? Here's one answer.

Killin’ ’Em for Condos

Tigers, Cougars, and More in the Back Yard

Miami's feline fringe is a vanishing breed

A Fish-Stomping Spree

"Somebody stomping on a fish — it doesn't make sense how she would perceive that as abusive"

Current Events

BEST PLACE TO BIRDWATCH

Frog Pond Wildlife Management Area

Valet Sharking

No tips for the weary; swan-eating croc irks park

"KILL 'EM"

Loving moments at the World Series

Hooked on Death

When clueless tourist meets shameless skipper, it's a good bet there'll be blood on the docks

Letters to the Editor

From the issue of August 23, 2001

Swimming with the Sharks

An eight-year-old's severed arm and a broker's chewed-off leg aren't enough to convince Florida to ban interactive diving

Slaughter Alley

Big dead cats in the middle of the road -- lots of them

Snake It Up

Snake Day