Sarasota Bay Live Webcam View
A live view from the Florida coastline at Sarasota, an area not yet affected by the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, as the tourist season starts to pick up.
At a time when many are growing concerned that tourism numbers to Florida, and the coastal areas in particular, will be severely affected by the oils slick form the ongoing spill in the Gulf of Mexico, My World Webcams brings a live webcam feed directly form the coast at Sarasota Bay.
The view from Siesta Key, one of the famous Florida Keys, shows a tranquil and peaceful scene, with no sign of the tar balls that have been appearing elsewhere. In fact, local tourism officials have been quick to point out that this area had been largely unaffected, and hope that visitors will continue to arrive in large numbers, as the local bars and restaurants of the tourist industry are heavily dependent on their arrival.
The bay at Sarastoa and its surrounding area appeared on the earliest maps of the area, being named Zarazote on one dating from the early 1700s. Hunting in the area had supported native populations for more than ten thousand years as Florida attracted some of the earliest human settlements in the hemisphere. Following the retreat of the glaciers, ocean levels rose creating the current coastline and the natural bounty of Sarasota Bay provided food for inhabitants for over five thousand years before Europeans began exploration of the area in 1513 and later, establishing settlements along its shores.
Sarasota Bay is one of twenty-eight estuaries in the country that have been named by the U.S. Congress as an estuary of national significance. The bay lies between barrier islands called keys, that separate the body of water from the Gulf of Mexico and the Florida mainland. Longboat Key, Lido Key, Siesta Key, and Casey Key are the major keys that delineate the main bay and its smaller portions.
Since 1921, when Sarasota County was created, the bay lies in areas governed both by Manatee County and Sarasota County. After Florida became an American state, large counties were carved up from time to time, to form new and smaller counties. From 1855 to 1921 the bay was governed by Manatee County, and from 1834 to 1855 the bay was governed by Hillsborough County. Governance prior to that has been Spanish, French, English, and during the Civil War, Florida was Confederate. The concept of “governance of natural resources” did not exist among the Amerindians who harvested the bounty of Sarasota Bay for thousands of years without diminishing it.
ABC Webcam the abc of webcam, covering holiday destinations, events and news: Live view from Sarasota Bay in Florida, USA