During the day, visitors can explore reptile, bird and panther enclosures, alligator and crocodile pits, and a nature boardwalk. But most people come for a safari tour on a swamp buggy. The reason for that is if we only had native animals, you wouldn't see any. They're mainly nocturnal, shy and very small, like raccoons, opossums and armadillos. Up ahead, a bison lies peacefully in the afternoon sun.
Natives also understand the many uses of plants that grow in the Everglades.
The roots of cattails, for example, can be used to make bread, while other parts of the plant have properties similar to aloe, which relieves burns and moisturizes the skin. Perez hands us a stem of the saw palmetto, which tastes like celery. Indians have wrestled alligators for hundreds of years. Alligator wrestling first became a tourist attraction in the early 1900s, when a visitor stopped to watch an Indian in Miami performing the feat. Perez has no plans to wrestle gators, but he does something just about as daring by climbing into the reptile's enclosure.