Weedon Island Preserve is a 3100-acre county park located in St Petersburg, Florida. It is a wildlife refuge encompassing a series of islands in Tampa Bay, consisting mostly of mangrove swamp and slash pine/cabbage palmetto scrub. But its primary importance is as an archaeological site, centered around a number of Native American burial mounds and midden (trash) piles. These were excavated in 1923 and 1924 by Jesse Walter Fewkes of the Smithsonian Institution. Fewkes excavated some of the burial mounds and some of the shell middens, and found 400 buried skeletons, stone tools, and pottery shards. The pottery was made in two distinct types--the decorated pots were always found alongside the buried bodies, and were dubbed "sacred" pottery, while in the trash middens the pottery was plain and utilitarian, dubbed "secular" pottery. In his scientific paper describing the finds, Fewkes called the people who lived here the "Weeden Island Culture", and that mis-spelling of the island's name has caused confusion ever since. More mounds were excavated in the 1960's, and it was established that there were two time periods of occupation; Weeden I, from around 300 CE to 800 CE, and Weeden II, from 800 CE to 1200 CE. Similar versions of the Weeden Island Culture were also found in northern Florida, Alabama, and Georgia.
By the time the Spanish conquistadores arrived in Tampa Bay in 1528, the Weeden Island people had been replaced by a group known as the Calusa. After European contact, the Calusa were virtually wiped out across Florida by smallpox and other diseases, and by the late 18th century, a breakaway group of Creeks entered Florida, found it virtually uninhabited, and formed the culture we know today as Seminoles.
Weedon Island Preserve. The Cultural and Natural History Center houses exhibits on the history and wildlife found in the park.
The museum exhibits.
The variety of shell tools made by the Weedon Island people.
The construction of a dugout canoe. The tree is felled with stone axes (left) then a fire is built on top of it (center) and the charred wood is scraped out to form the walls of the canoe (right).
A collection of stone tools, including scrapers, projectile points, and fishing-net weights.
Illustration of how Weedon Island pottery was made. No pottery wheel was used. The clay was rolled into a rope, then coiled to form the wall of the pottery, the coils were then smoothed, and the pot placed into a fire to harden it into ceramic.
A reproduction of a decorated ceremonial pot.
An original Weedon Island pot.
Pieces of pottery shards.
One of the raised boardwalks in the nature preserve.
The archaeological dig sites are off-limits to the public.
The kayak trail winds through the mangrove swamps.
During the 1930's, St Petersburg's airport was located on Weedon Island. This is the site of one of the old runways--now overgrown with Cabbage Palms.
The remains of one of the aircraft hangars.
Scorched palm tree--the result of a deliberate controlled burn to periodically clear out the underbrush. Fire from lightning strikes has always been a natural part of the pine-scrub forest ecosystem
A Beach Sunflower.
I don't know what plant this is, but it's cool-looking. :)
The Observation Tower.
View from the Tower.
Fiddler Crab.
A pair of Tree Crabs.
A native Green Anole lizard. Because it can change its color from green to brown (as it is here), the Green Anole is also known as the American Chameleon.
An Osprey.