Florida Outdoors Saltwater Habitats Beaches and Dunes Florida's sandy coastline rings most of the state except for the Big Bend and Ten Thousand Islands regions along the Gulf coast and the Florida Keys. Most of this 745 miles of beach occurs on barrier islands.
Beaches are highly dynamic areas.
They are subjects of frequent change because of winds, waves and tides. The beach and dune habitat includes the unvegetated beach, and the dune zone up to the point where the stable vegetation of the maritime forests begin. Landward of the non-vegetated beach zone, is the foredune area. The species inhabiting this zone vary depending on location. Sea oats are found in this zone throughout the state and there will be several other, low growing species in association with this species.