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St. Vincent Island
CHAPTER 2
STUDY AREA
The Northwest coast of Florida is characterized by sandy beaches and extensive barrier
islands. St. Vincent Island is a coastal barrier island located near the middle of the Florida
panhandle coast, approximately 120 km southwest of Tallahassee, Florida (Figure 1.1). The
island is located just west of the mouth of the Apalachicola River. The island is approximately
0.5 km from the nearest point on the mainland. It is 6 km wide at its east end, 14 km long and
covers an area of over 50 square km (Davis and Mokray, 2000). It is one of the largest Gulf
coast barrier islands.
The island has been inhabited sparsely and intermittently throughout its history. The
oldest paleoindian pottery shards on the island date to approximately 4,000 yr B.P. (Miller et al.,
1981). In 1633, the island was named by Franciscan Friars who were visiting the local
Apalachee tribes. Around 1750, members of the Creek and Seminole tribes entered the area and
inhabited the island. By the 1960’s, the island was in private hands, stocked with exotic game
and was being used as a hunting ground. The island was later acquired by the federal
government and in 1968, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service established the St. Vincent Island
National Wildlife Refuge (Davis and Mokray, 2000).
Dominating the local geomorphology is a well-developed beach ridge plain that covers
the surface of the island (Figure 2.1). More than 100 ridges have been formed over the island’s
approximately 4,000-year history. Many of these ridges are marked by eolian decoration.
Previous studies conducted by Stapor (1973, 1975) and Campbell (1986) have divided the beach
ridge plain on the island into 12 ridge sets separated by erosional truncations (Figure 1.2). The
oldest set (Set A) is on the northernmost side of the island and the youngest set (Set L) fronts a
portion of the active modern beach on the southeast portion of the island. The ridges on St.
Vincent Island are concave seaward. Ridges on the northern half of the island generally have
lower elevations than those on the southern half. Ridges within sets A, B, C and D have crest
elevations of approximately 1 m (Stapor and Tanner, 1977). Ridges within sets E, F, G, H, I, J,
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