Little Salt Spring is an

archaeological Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...

and

paleontological Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of foss ...

site in North Port, Florida. The site has been owned by the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private research university in Coral Gables, Florida. , the university enrolled 19,096 students in 12 colleges and schools across nearly 350 academic majors and programs, incl ...

since 1980 with research performed there by the university's

Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science The Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS ) is the University of Miami's academic and research institution for the study of oceanography and atmospheric sciences. Founded in 1943, the University of Miami's Rosenstiel Schoo ...

. It is located directly off Price Boulevard between US 41 and Interstate 75 adjacent to Heron Creek Middle School in the

North Port, Florida North Port is a city located in Sarasota County, Florida, United States. The population was 74,793 at the 2020 US Census. It is part of the North Port– Bradenton–Sarasota Metropolitan Statistical Area. It was originally developed by G ...

History

In 2013, the

began considering selling the site to Sarasota County, Florida, due to funding being cut towards maintaining the site and its facilities. On July 10, 1979, the site was added to the National Register of Historic Places. Little Salt Spring is a feature of the

karst topography Karst is a topography formed from the dissolution of soluble rocks such as limestone, dolomite, and gypsum. It is characterized by underground drainage systems with sinkholes and caves. It has also been documented for more weathering-resistant ...

of Florida, specifically an example of a sinkhole. It is classified as a third

magnitude Magnitude may refer to: Mathematics *Euclidean vector, a quantity defined by both its magnitude and its direction *Magnitude (mathematics), the relative size of an object *Norm (mathematics), a term for the size or length of a vector *Order of ...

spring. The numerous deep vents at the bottom of the sinkhole feed oxygen-depleted groundwater into it, producing an

anoxic The term anoxia means a total depletion in the level of oxygen, an extreme form of hypoxia or "low oxygen". The terms anoxia and hypoxia are used in various contexts: * Anoxic waters, sea water, fresh water or groundwater that are depleted of diss ...

environment below a depth of about . This fosters the preservation of Paleo-Indian and early Archaic artifacts and ecofacts, as well as fossil bones of the extinct

megafauna In terrestrial zoology, the megafauna (from Greek μέγας ''megas'' "large" and New Latin ''fauna'' "animal life") comprises the large or giant animals of an area, habitat, or geological period, extinct and/or extant. The most common threshold ...

once found in Florida. Originally it was thought that Little Salt Spring was a shallow freshwater pond, but in the 1950s

SCUBA divers This is a list of underwater divers whose exploits have made them notable. Underwater divers are people who take part in underwater diving activities – Underwater diving is practiced as part of an occupation, or for recreation, where t ...

discovered that it was a true sinkhole extending downward over , similar to the

cenote A cenote ( or ; ) is a natural pit, or sinkhole, resulting from the collapse of limestone bedrock that exposes groundwater. The regional term is specifically associated with the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico, where cenotes were commonly used ...

s of the

Yucatán Peninsula The Yucatán Peninsula (, also , ; es, Península de Yucatán ) is a large peninsula in southeastern Mexico and adjacent portions of Belize and Guatemala. The peninsula extends towards the northeast, separating the Gulf of Mexico to the north ...

(another karst region). The actual depth of the surface pond is with a central shaft dropping vertically to an inverted cone with a maximum determined depth at the outer edges of . There are ledges around the wall of the cenote at below the present water level.

Prehistoric human use

The water level in the spring has varied over time. Twelve to thirteen thousand years ago the ocean level was about 100 meters (more than 300 feet) lower than at present, drawing down the water table in Florida, and the water level in Little Salt Spring was lower than at present. The basin around the spring and a

slough Slough () is a town and unparished area in the unitary authority of the same name in Berkshire, England, bordering west London. It lies in the Thames Valley, west of central London and north-east of Reading, at the intersection of the M4, ...

extending away from it are filled with moist, soft peat. Hundreds of burials dating from 5,200 to 6,800 years ago have been found in the slough. As has happened in other wetland burials in Florida, such as at the

Windover Archaeological Site The Windover Archeological Site is a Middle Archaic ( 6000 to 5000 BC) archaeological site and National Historic Landmark in Brevard County near Titusville, Florida, United States, on the central east coast of the state. Windover is a muck pon ...

, brain matter survived in many of the skulls. In the 1970s the overturned shell of an extinct giant land tortoise was found on the ledge. A wooden stake had been driven between the

carapace A carapace is a dorsal (upper) section of the exoskeleton or shell in a number of animal groups, including arthropods, such as crustaceans and arachnids, as well as vertebrates, such as turtles and tortoises. In turtles and tortoises, the under ...

and the plastron, and there is evidence of a fire under the tortoise. It appears that the tortoise had been cooked in its shell. The

radiocarbon Carbon-14, C-14, or radiocarbon, is a radioactive isotope of carbon with an atomic nucleus containing 6 protons and 8 neutrons. Its presence in organic materials is the basis of the radiocarbon dating method pioneered by Willard Libby and co ...

date for the wooden stake was 12,030 years ago; a bone from the tortoise was dated to 13,450 years ago. Large numbers of human bones have been recovered from the spring itself, but were not collected under controlled conditions.

References

External links

Sarasota County listings
a
National Register of Historic Places

Sarasota County listings
a
Florida's Office of Cultural and Historical Programs

Little Salt Spring
at the Marine Affairs and Policy Division of RSMAS {{University of Miami National Register of Historic Places in Sarasota County, Florida University of Miami Archaeological sites in Florida Sinkholes of Florida Bodies of water of Sarasota County, Florida Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Florida Underwater archaeological sites North Port, Florida

History

Prehistoric human use

See also

References

External links