Chamber Chats | Protecting, Connecting & Conserving Rookery Bay

In this episode of Chamber Chats, we sit down with TJ Snopkowski, Executive Director of Friends of Rookery Bay, to explore the vital role Rookery Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve plays in protecting Southwest Florida's coastal environment.

TJ shares how Friends of Rookery Bay supports conservation, environmental education, and community engagement while highlighting the connection between a healthy ecosystem and a thriving local economy.

In this episode, we explore:

• The role of Rookery Bay in preserving Southwest Florida's coastal environment 
• Educational programs, events, and experiences that connect the community with nature 
• How environmental conservation supports our region's economy and quality of life 
• The importance of advocacy and stewardship for future generations 

Whether you're passionate about conservation, enjoy exploring Southwest Florida's natural beauty, or want to learn how our environment impacts our economy, this episode offers valuable insight into one of our region's greatest assets.

Tune in to discover how protecting our coastal environment helps strengthen our community today and for generations to come.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:12

In this episode of Chamber Chats, we sit down with TJ Startkowski, Executive Director of the Friends of Rookery Bay. TJ, I'm excited to sit down with you today.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

Yeah, me as well. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_01 0:21

Well, thank you for joining us. Tell us all about Rookery Bay.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

Yeah, so you know, Rookery Bay, uh, a lot of folks don't realize that we have such an area of both ecological and economic importance here right in Southwest Florida in Rookery Bay. It's a 110,000-acre national estuary and research reserve. And so it's one of 30 across the country areas of just such crucial ecological importance that they're set aside from a conservation perspective to ensure that groundbreaking research happens and everything from fisheries to invasives to prescribed burns, water quality, you name it. We, though we're part of the National Estuary and Research Reserve system, we're kind of considered to be the flagship reserve, uh, if not one of the flagships, just given our sheer size. It's massive. We border uh the western Everglades all the way up to the Gordon River and cover 40% of Collier County's coastline. So yeah, absolutely massive, including the largest undisturbed mangrove forest in North America. So yeah, it's uh the area is uh incredibly important for us. And it's just something that uh, you know, my job now, being relatively new to my role as ED, uh is just trying to educate the public on that importance as well as get them excited to come out and recreate, use our lands, use our waters, uh, and just have an appreciation for the science that happens there and the conservation that happens there.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

Well, tell us a little bit about what goes on behind the scenes that viewers may not see, right, when they come as a guest to your space. How many people are on your team? What does it take to really make sure that that all balances?

SPEAKER_00 1:39

Yeah, no, great question. And I'm probably about to confuse you all a bit here because we're a public-private partnership. And so what that means is I'm uh an executive director for a 501c3, which is the Friends of Rookery Bay, but we directly support the Rookery Bay National Estuary and Research Reserve, which is made up of multiple entities, including Florida Department of Environmental Protection, Florida International University, uh, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Audubon, a lot of a lot of uh different names and abbreviations under one roof. Uh so we have a team of about 35, including us as well, um, at the reserve at our physical location, which is 300 Tower Road. That's where our environmental learning center and our administration buildings are. Uh, but in addition to that, so many things happen under that roof and in the field. Anything from, I mean, education. We have a totally robust education department under the state, under FDEP, and they do uh a program called Teachers on the Estuary, TOE, and uh literally bringing out local Collier County and actually uh more than Collier County, it stretches beyond our county, educators just to learn, um, to go out on a trawl to get an experience in Rookery Bay that they can then uh take their students to uh in field trips. We have field trips for uh elementary school, middle school, high school students all across Collier County, and it really is quite amazing. Uh we hear stories every single day of kids who grew up here, right here in Collier County, have never been on a boat. And so when they ever, you know, go and get to do a trawl and they pull up all these microorganisms and and fish and things like that, um, they just get to see something that they've never seen before. And it really does uh kind of light a passion for a lot of them, including one we currently have actually an intern on staff for this year who is an environmental science student at FGCU, but started out as a person who just came out to the learning center as a student and then who worked up to volunteer, et cetera. So just trying to kind of bridge that gap between um people who are here locally and maybe those that don't have a total understanding of what we do, and then just get them excited about it and to remind everyone that this is yours. I mean, these are public lands and waters, and uh it's our job to protect them, but it's everyone's to to use and and share responsibly.

SPEAKER_01 3:35

So we have a beautiful education center right there on site. Tell us a little bit more about what the general public can just kind of walk up and experience.

SPEAKER_00 3:42

Yeah, absolutely. So um you can come in here and or come, you know, at uh 300 Tower Road in Naples, you can stop in. We have aquariums, touch tanks, uh, we also have trails on site that you can literally walk out of our building, cross the bridge on Henderson Creek, and you're out there, you're in it. Uh and it's quite amazing. Even the bridge itself, people have seen manatees, sharks, jellyfish, any number of species right underneath them, not realizing that, hey, you don't have to be in open water because estuaries are fisheries, and and you know, over 75% of marine life starts in an estuary. So uh people don't realize kind of the great experiences and opportunities they have right there on our site. You can also see uh our art gallery. Right now, we currently have an exhibit going through it. Uh, we actually just had an art reception last night for it, but we have different artists throughout the years. Uh, we have photography exhibits, and we've been very fortunate long before my tenure, so many really, really impressive local artists, but also ones that are nationally known, have done engagements with us, whether that's you know, have an exhibition or have just, you know, had um had pieces on site for us. I mean, anyone from uh Clyde Butcher uh to Guy Harvey to Paul Arsenaux, I mean, we really do have quite a quite a great roster of local artists, and we have a really close partnership with UAC, United Arts Collier, um, where we do like to have these exhibitions throughout the year too. Uh, separate from that, at any time you walk in, you can sit in our uh our auditorium and see our PBS documentary just playing on a loop, and it kind of tells you a bit more about the history, um, the effort to really protect Rookery Bay from development way back when in the 60s, uh, and then as kind of some of the management efforts and education efforts that happen to this day. And so separate from what we have kind of physically on site, uh, at any time, you know, if you come out to Rookery Bay, you can see prescribed burns, uh, you can see um invasives removal, I mean, just general stewardship practices. People don't realize what goes into uh managing uh a reserve of that size, and especially with so many people or uh such a, I would say such a sparse staff, uh, only 35 people managing 110,000 acres, and the bulk of those people aren't natural resource managers. So it's a very, very finite team. And anything from uh tracking crocodiles to uh groundbreaking fisheries research with sharks, uh, I've actually been able to myself hold a bull shark that we pulled out and tagged in Pumpkin Bay, one of our bays. Uh it really is quite amazing. Sea turtle um nesting programs. Uh quite literally, we're responsible for the overwhelming majority of the region, including the 10,000 islands. And we have a pretty tiny staff and interns that manage that. And going out there and, you know, literally excavating nests, trying to help uh ensure that sea turtles are able to survive and get into the water, where even there they face a one in 1,000 survival rate. So yeah, the work we're doing is is quite immersive uh and quite expansive. And it definitely, I would say, is would probably surprise a lot of folks to realize just how much happens there. Uh, we also have visiting researchers that are often on site. I mean, we have quite literally have dorms in the reserve for that purpose. Uh, we have folks out there conducting water quality monitoring, um, you know, sea level rise, things of that nature. So quite impressive.

SPEAKER_01 6:35

Aaron Powell Well, and talk to me about the importance just of uh, as you're indicating, right, the protection of this space. I had the opportunity to travel to DC this summer to advocate um for the Everglades. Yeah. And and understanding, I think uh I love that they've repositioned it as calling it America's Everglades because it's really important to the ecology of our entire country.

SPEAKER_00 6:51

Yeah, well, you know, that's a I'm really glad you mentioned the Everglades because I my stump speech, uh so to speak, is that I think it's important to mention just how contingent the Everglades quality is on our water because we border them. And so I've always tell people it's not hyperbole, in my opinion, to say that we're the most important estuary in the United States because we border the most important uh ecological structure in the United States, which is the Florida Everglades. Um, I was very fortunate to be at uh Clyde Butcher's museum this past weekend, and Betty Ossiola was giving a talk and she said, I'll never forget this, she said that if the Amazon rainforests are the lungs of the earth, then the Everglades are the kidneys. And that just goes to show you how important they are. And so with us being their direct neighbor, uh bordering them, literally bordering them, our water goes right into theirs. It's so, so important for what we do to make sure that that water quality means is, you know, stays. Um, but also even even some of our volunteer-led efforts like Team Ocean, where they're just out there educating boaters and and, you know, those who are recreating on the waters about you know, safe practices to ensure that they're not leaving anything behind except maybe they're wake. That's right. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 7:50

Nothing but footprints. I like that. Tell us more about Friends of Rookery Bay and how we can support you. I believe you have a membership program.

SPEAKER_00 7:55

Yeah, we have uh multiple options that people can support. So, you know, as the Friends group, our job is a bit unique. You know, I've worked for a few nonprofits in my career, and this is the first one where my entire purpose is to make sure that this large entity uh kind of maintains operations and is sustainable. So we do everything from fundraising to advocacy to outreach. Um, we also do, of course, you know, education and things of that nature, not to the level that the state does it, they've got a full education team, but we're always trying to make sure that people are just aware of what we're doing and trying to educate them on what we're doing. Um, people can support us through any number of ways, one of which is, of course, individual giving, you know, qualified charitable distributions, things of that nature. But we also do have a really robust memberships program, which candidly I tell people who don't even live here that they should purchase our membership because of the reciprocals alone. Um, if yeah, depending on which level you get, you know, they start pretty low for students, but if you wanted to start getting some of the reciprocal benefits, it's $100 and up for family, but so it's you know, um usually two people. Uh and it includes access to over 1,400 organizations around the country, including several here that are really impressive, like the Conservancy of Southwest Florida, the Edison and Ford winter estates, uh the Everglades Wonder Gardens, the Rev Institute, uh, Revs Institute. I mean, so many different groups here uh accept us as reciprocals. And of course, separate from that, yeah, you're directly supporting the conservation efforts of Rookery Bay. You get a 10% discount on our programs and our nature store, and then also free admission year-round. So I always tell folks that uh we it starts as little as $25 all the way up to $10,000, depending on which level of membership you'd like to have. But uh either way, you really, really can't find a better bargain um for what you're getting with ours while also knowing that you're doing some good work and helping support and conserve our natural resources.

SPEAKER_01 9:28

So which we love and it requires a lot of advocacy. Yeah. We understand maybe advocacy directly related efforts that you have are involved with and then those of your partners.

SPEAKER_00 9:37

Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, being a uh private not-for-profit, uh, we have the benefit where we aren't part of a bureaucracy like a like an like a government entity, like many of our partners are. And so we do have that benefit of being able to kind of directly reach out to legislators, lawmakers, um, local leaders, and just really kind of stump for the cause and just let them know the importance of preserving our space and and conserving it too. And that those are two different things. And I always like to point that out because some folks often kind of lump it all into you know one environmental umbrella. But when you preserve something, when you're trying to protect it for generations, uh the idea is that you're trying to leave it, you know, untouched as is. When you conserve something, it's uh through sustainable yield, you know, treating Earth like a garden. The goal is to try and maintain it for the greatest good, for the greatest amount of time, for the greatest, uh, you know, greatest amount of people. And so I always like to tell folks that when you're in a reserve like ours, we do a little bit of both. So obviously we do not want development happening within our space, right? We do not want to get in any way of the natural occurrences of Sand Hill or of Rookery Island, but at the same time, uh, we also do understand that many people rely on us, on our natural uh resources for survival here. I mean, our mangroves are what protect many of these communities that abate the reserve. There's a reason why we didn't have the devastating flooding that we saw in Fort Myers Beach after Hurricane E, and because we have so many mangroves in this part of the of the region, separate from that, also water quality. I mean, all of those things are contingent on what we do in the reserve. So just trying to let folks know, let our legislators know, local business leaders. Um, hey, you may not have heard much about us, uh, but that's probably a good thing because that means that we're doing everything right. So here's ways you can support us and help drive that further and just kind of really help uh preserve and conserve our resources for the greatest good for the greatest amount of time going forward.

SPEAKER_01 11:13

Good. Curiosity, talk to me a little bit about prescribed burns because our office gets phone calls when they say. Oh, yeah. I believe it is.

SPEAKER_00 11:23

Yeah, it's so important. Um, you know, so prescribed burns are a very, very valuable uh and crucial ecological management tool that we have at our disposal. Uh and really the goal behind it is just to remove old growth, uh, to make sure that areas are able to kind of thrive. And so one thing about it as well, as we see, you know, extreme weather events and and you know, just changes overall in weather patterns, oftentimes we do have areas that are drier than they used to be, right? That are essentially uh kindling for potential uh disastrous proportions. And we've seen those here. We've seen, you know, wildfires that weren't prescribed burns that have just got out of control because of things like I think one was a lawnmower that uh that had caught fire, if I'm not mistaken. And so as a result of that, prescribed burns is a very important natural resource tool to ensure that old growth is removed while also helping keep ecosystems fresh. Uh, it also helps remove invasives. I mean, we have so many invasive species, as you all know, iguanas, Burmese pythons, um, and those are just the ones in the land. It doesn't include things like lionfish and all the other things that we're dealing with uh here in Southwest Florida and really just the whole Florida coastline itself. Um, but at the same time, what it does is it allows for, I mean, I'm not a forester, so bear with me here, but it basically allows for the land to heal after being burned. Um, and it's done in close coordination. Obviously, it's done by the state, and it's just it is done with an exact science. So the goal is to try and prevent uh potentially disastrous outcomes in the future when land is not managed. And you know, we've seen that in other states, we've seen in other places where thankfully Florida has kind of set the standard for prescribed burns and how they can be an effective tool to ensure both ecosystem health but also public safety.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

So yeah, thanks for talking through that with me. Yeah. So in addition to uh visiting your beautiful visitor center, right, helping to support you through advocacy efforts, the education opportunities you're offering, what are some of the other ways that we can get involved and help support your work?

SPEAKER_00 13:07

Yeah, absolutely. So, of course, obviously just sharing a message, uh, getting people to come out is super important for us. We want people to see the work we're doing. And, you know, we've got tons of exhibits and things like that, staff as well, who are happy to talk to any members of the public who come out. Separate from that, of course, we have folks who have supported really, really impressive things, including interns. Uh, we have multiple funds uh that are obviously managed to the Collier Community Foundation, um, but a lot of estate planned uh gifts, things of that nature, we're essentially trying to just ensure operations are successful going forward and funding positions that are fulfilling crucial roles, um, but maybe don't uh often get the budget approval that we'd like them to to. Um so, you know, prime example of that is we have sea turtle interns, shark fisheries interns, we're trying to get an avian intern, all of those things are usually funded through those generous donations and and you know planned gifts. So being able to just try and enforce that with people and let them know hey, look, we're relying on basically students or graduate students or you know, seasonal labor to help maintain some of these very, very important things that we're doing. So if you ever uh uh were looking to do something, by all means, we'd be happy to set up a fund to try and support that further. So love it.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

Well, TJ, you've talked us through so many great things that your that your team is up to. First of all, thank you. Oh, yeah, on behalf of this whole community for not only protecting and preserving and conserving what makes our place so special, but offering the opportunity for education to help us understand a little more deeply. Is there anything we didn't talk about today that you'd like to make sure our viewers understand?

SPEAKER_00 14:30

You know, one thing as well, some of the other functions, I guess, or some of the other uh opportunities available to visitors uh here at Rookery Bay. Uh, we have an eco-tour partner, Rising Tide Explorers, and it's the only fully biologist-led eco-tour provider in Southwest Florida. And so when you go out, every single person there is a biologist, and it is quite stunning. I've been out a few times with them. Uh, and what's great is when you go out and book a tour with them, whether it's kayaking, whether it's on a boat, you also are supporting the reserve because they do give back a portion of their proceeds directly back to Friends of Rookery Bay to support our efforts. Um, but definitely book them. Uh the owners there, the young's Ryan and Janine are amazing, and they'll definitely take care of you all and get anyone out there to just kind of see these spaces. I mean, people, you can't get to Sand Hill, which is the Collier High Point, um, without going through rising tide or without working, you know, for the reserve. So some of these really, really cool opportunities that a lot of folks don't get the benefit of, definitely worth checking out. Um, yeah, severed from that, we also just have events throughout the year. So uh we have an event called Science Night, which is kind of a fun, you know, uh, I would say low lift. Uh, you don't need to go in there expecting to get a class classroom lecture, but the idea is just trying to educate the public, adults primarily, you know, high school students and up on simple things like, you know, plastics or, you know, uh impacts of water quality, while also kind of keeping it fun and light. We have games and trivia and refreshments and things like that. So those happen throughout the year. Uh gosh, we have our community day every year in May. Uh, we have celebrations for things like our Adopt a Sea Turtle program or for National Estuaries Week, which is in September. So any number of those things, just our calendar is always full, and that's by design. So whether it's a you know an art gallery exhibition reception or whether it's uh, you know, a seminar on coastal training and engagement and responsible landscaping, we have so many things happening at the reserve, and we really, really do implore the public just to check us out and come on out sometime for a class or something of that nature. So excellent.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

Well, TJ, I've really enjoyed getting to learn more about your valuable work. Again, thank you not only for protecting and preserving, but for giving access to all your county residents and beyond to learn more about what's going on in our own backyard.

SPEAKER_00 16:24

Yeah, absolutely. They are thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 16:26

Excellent. Well, thank you for sitting down with us today and look forward to spending a little more time in your space.

SPEAKER_00 16:30

Yeah, thank you. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 16:31

Great, thank you. If you or your organization have a story to highlight, reach out to the Greater Naples Chamber. We'd love to continue the conversation. We'll see you next time on Chamber Chat.