LEE COUNTY, Fla. — In the middle of Estero Bay rests a 100-acre island you can only get to by boat. It is so remote some people even have trouble getting there.
“It’s very primitive. So, there’s no real infrastructure,” Zach Lozano explained.
Lozano, who works for Florida State Parks, guided NBC2 to the island, officially known as the Mound Key Archaeological State Park.
“It’s an amazing privilege that we’re able to come out here and enjoy this,” Lozano said.
Above, Gumbo Limbo trees stretch high into the sky. But it’s what’s below – on a trail leading upward – that hints this is more than just untouched land.
Countless shells cover the island.
“Where you’re standing here would have been the highest elevation in Southwest Florida for so many years,” Lozano said at the top of Mound Key. “What makes this very significant is that this was the capital of the Calusas.”
The Calusa Indians – who once controlled Southwest Florida for centuries.
Inside the Marco Island Historical Museum, their legacy is brought to life with vast, detailed exhibits.
“They were here first, and they were here the longest,” curator Austin Bell explained. “They shaped a lot of the land around us.”
The Calusa were a complex, sophisticated society. They were also unique in that they were one of the only Native American societies to thrive without agriculture.
“Instead, they relied on the estuarine and marine environments around them to develop technology and surplus food and things that helped expand their domain,” Bell explained.
That meant seafood and a whole lot of shells – and those shells didn’t go to waste.
The Calusa built massive shell mounds, like Mound Key, which is more than 30 feet high.
“Back then, Mound Key looked a lot different. It was a lot taller, a lot wider, and there was very little vegetation,” Lozano described. “They wanted to construct something very tall and very powerful, essentially.”
It was powerful in more ways than one. Not only did shell mounds give the Calusa a great vantage point, but they also helped protect them from Mother Nature.
Imagine all the storms Mound Key has weathered over the years – including Hurricane Ian.
Built up so high, it’s still here.
“The island itself fared very well in the storm,” Lozano said. “This natural material, this shell matter, is very resilient against storm surge and wind. It definitely went through a test.”
“It shows you how well they were in tune with their environment,” Bell said. “They were able to adapt and learn from the past.”
That’s a lesson people today can learn from them as southwest Florida reshapes its coastline centuries later.
In the 1700s, long after the Spanish sailed to their shores, disease would wipe out most of the Calusa.
Any development would eventually destroy most of their shell mounds.
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But not Mound Key.
That’s why preserving the land – and the rich history it holds – is so important.
Lozano asks that people visit and enjoy it but take nothing but pictures and leave nothing but footprints.
“You had these people that didn’t have any modern machinery or anything of that nature, but were able to construct this island where they housed so many different people. It was essentially the center of their culture, and it still is here, a thousand years later,” he said. “It’s amazing what people can do when they come together and try to formulate a way.”
The original Calusa-inspired music featured in the video was created by Kat Apple.
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