SNAKE BIGHT

NAME: Snake Bight
COUNTY: Monroe
ROADS: 4WD
GRID: 4
CLIMATE: hot and full of mosquitos most of the year
BEST TIME TO VISIT: winter, the colder the better
COMMENTS: Located in Everglades National Park, marked as Snake Bight Trail on most park maps. Trail leading to Snake Bight itself is about 1.5 miles each way, with a sign on the main park road directing to it.
REMAINS: old boardwalk, old roadway visible in some areas, little else
Inside Everglades National Park is Snake Bight, a small place more widely known for its large concentration of mosquitoes than for anything else. The term Snake Bight itself is something of a play on words; a “bight” is a bay within a bay. Before modern settlers ventured down that way the Calusa Indians lived in and around Snake Bight. Later the residents of Flamingo and visiting fishermen and hunters set up camps in the area. In the early 1900’s a canal was dug out from the bight up to the main road, with the soil used to create a road leading down there as well. Around 1940 the E. T. Knight Fish Company established a base at Snake Bight along the coastal edge of the canal. It had a fish processing plant and many huts and buildings for the men who lived and worked there. The fishing was done mostly with airboats and the flats were very shallow. Hurricanes and heavy storms have taken their toll on Snake Bight over the years, reducing the former road to a narrow overgrown trail and washing away almost all evidence to suggest anything other than mosquitoes ever lived there. Submitted by: Jim Pike

Everglades National Park sign on the main park road

Courtesy Jim Pike


"Snake Bight Trail" the old road leading down to the site
Courrtesy Jim Pike


The old Ingraham Canal, also known as Snake Bight Canal, running along next to the trail
Courtesy Jim Pike


Snake Bight looking out into Florida Bay
Courtesy Jim Pike


Old boardwalk at Snake Bight
Courtesy Jim Pike


E C Knight Fish Company at Snake Bight, 1940's, courtesy of the National Park Service


2010, end of Snake Bight trail at location of former EC Knight Fish Camp, standing where the 1940's Natl Park Service photo was taken
Courtesy Jim Pike

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