## 6 Conclusions  
Geophysical methods can map the difference in conductivities (salinity) of a subsurface formation effectively. The results of the EM survey show the apparent conductivity measurements systematically increased from February to April 2016 in the Seven Palm system. This demonstrates how the salinity of the surface water and groundwater changes during the dry season. The general increase in the salinity reflects a decreased precipitation, increased evapotranspiration, and the influence of saline water from Florida Bay on the surface water and groundwater. The apparent conductivity showed a considerable decrease between February 2016 and January 2017 in both the West Lake and Seven Palm systems. These changes suggest a freshening of the groundwater and may reflect the effects of increased flow due to restoration efforts. Furthermore, the apparent conductivity change between 2016 and 2017 is more pronounced in the Seven Palm system than in the West Lake system. This suggests the restoration efforts may have made a positive contribution to the Seven Palm system but not yet to the West Lake system.  
The floating resistivity survey efficiently characterized the spatial variations in surface water groundwater salinity. In general, both the surface water and the groundwater increased in salinity from north to south. In contrast, the surface water salinity increased from west to east while the groundwater salinity decreased from west to east.  
We estimated a mean local formation factor of 10.7 \(\pm\) 1.8 for the coastal lakes of ENP. This estimated formation factor is slightly higher than the average regional formation factor of 9.65 estimated in another study [18]. The fact that the formation factor is obtained from few measurements may limit the finding of the salinity value in the coastal lakes of ENP. Hence, a further research study is needed to determine the accuracy of the estimated formation factor with minimum standard deviation. Another limitation of this study could be that the groundwater wells are situated approximately 1 m deep and may not represent the deeper groundwater.  
Conceptualization, M.E.K. and D.W.; methodology, M.E.K. and D.W.; software, M.E.K. and D.W.; validation, M.E.K., D.W., R.M.P., T.A.F. and C.J.M.; formal analysis, M.E.K.; investigation, M.E.K. and D.W.; resources, D.W.; data curation, M.E.K., D.W., R.M.P. and T.A.F.; writing--original draft preparation, M.E.K.; writing--review and editing, M.E.K., D.W., R.M.P., T.A.F. and C.J.M.; visualization, M.E.K.; supervision, D.W. and R.M.P.; project administration, D.W.; funding acquisition, R.M.P. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.  
This research was funded by the South Florida Water Management District, Contract numbers PO9500005699 and PO4500093831. This is contribution number 1401 from the Institute of Environment at Florida International University.  
Data will be available to readers upon reasonable request.  
**Acknowledgments:** We are grateful to [PERSON], [PERSON], and the anonymous reviewers for reviewing the paper and providing valuable suggestions that improved the manuscript. We are deeply grateful to [PERSON], who contributed to the data acquisition.  
**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.