When Frank and Monica Woll bought two tiny islands in the Florida Keys in 2016 for their semi-retirement, they considered themselves privileged caretakers rather than owners. The day they arrived on Molasses Keys, twin islands encircled by the turquoise-blue waters of the Florida Straits, a dolphin swam beside their boat. Already resident were scores of pelicans, cormorants, egrets, herons and numerous other species of birds in a plethora of mangrove trees.
Then came the hurricanes: Irma in 2017, and Ian last year. Today the trees, and the birds, are mostly gone. The storms, combined with rising sea levels, have stripped about one-fifth of the islands’ land mass.
