beaches

After years of fighting over who gets to use the beach, and where, in Walton County, Florida, public-use advocates are calling for a state constitutional amendment to finally settle the matter.

Thousands of complaints inspire plan to offer annual beach parking passes.

Gov. Ron DeSantis' signature undid a 2018 law requiring local governments to go through a judicial process before they can designate "dry sand" beach areas as publicly accessible.

Tons of sargassum — seaweed — is floating far out in the Atlantic Ocean. It could begin coming ashore in the spring.

Environmentalists remain perplexed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis' recent veto of a wildly popular bipartisan bill to safeguard the state’s coastlines and protect the health of beachgoers because he believed it gave the Florida Department of Health too much power

The additional money pledged by the state comes as an impasse continues with the Army Corps of Engineers over allocating federal funds to replenish eroded beaches.

A giant blob of seaweed, spanning 5,000 miles and weighing an estimated 6.1 million tons, threatens to blanket Florida beaches and Caribbean islands with smelly piles of decaying brown goop.

A record amount of seaweed is smothering Caribbean coasts from Puerto Rico to Barbados as tons of brown algae kill wildlife, choke the tourism industry and release toxic gases.

A nationwide lifeguard shortage is acute in South Florida, where lifeguards work year-round, not just in summer. This year, beachside cities have failed to garner the kind of interest they once relied on, many with more vacancies on their hands than they can fill, their lifeguards working overtime.

Shorebird eggs are often camouflaged in the sand, which is a form of predator protection. They can be easily missed and stepped on.

The Florida Horseshoe Crab Watch Program is a citizen-scientist initiative to collect data throughout the state.

As spring break gets going this week, the National Weather Service has extended the risk warning for the waters off Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.