‘ANCIENT ISLANDS:’ These are Florida’s oldest islands. But they’re not where you’d expect

POLK COUNTY, Fla. – Florida has plenty of strange islands surrounding its coasts, including “Black’s Island” with its pirate history and Egmont Key with its abandoned ghost town.

But if you’re going to look for the oldest islands in the state, you’ll have to look farther inland.

According to state officials, these “ancient islands” are actually found in Central Florida along the Lake Wales Ridge.

“Covered almost completely by water 2 million years ago, only a series of small islands existed in an expansive ocean,” the FWC reports. “It is these islands that make up today’s Lake Wales Ridge.”

The ridge extends about 100 miles from Clermont through Sebring and down to Venus.

In fact, the highest points in Florida — such as Sugarloaf Mountain and Iron Mountain — can be found along this ridge.

Biomes along the ridge vary from swamps to sandhills to its notable scrub habitat, which features unique animals like the Florida mouse and the endangered Florida Scrub-Jay.

While many Florida residents may be familiar with the state’s humidity (a perk of living so close to the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico), much of the ridge is dry and sandy, being very similar to a desert.

The region gets rain much like anywhere else in Florida, though rainwater drains quickly through the sand, which is why the area is so dried out.

However, some of the water manages to collect in many of the small ponds scattered across the landscape between ridges.

Because the dry habitats are so pyrogenic, prescribed burns are often used in these scrub areas to keep the region preserved.

However, those who want to go out and visit can easily do so, as public parks like the Catfish Creek Preserve and Lake Wales Ridge State Forest are located on large tracts of the ridge.

But if you want to get a view of the ridge without leaving the comfort of home, former News 6 Chief Meteorologist Tom Sorrells visited Sugarloaf Mountain in Lake County earlier this year.

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