KSC-02PD-0772

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. -- Young alligators share grassy space beside a body of water on KSC. The Center shares a boundary with the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, which harbors nearly 5,000 American alligators. Some of those gators can be seen in the canals and ponds around KSC. The refuge is also habitat for more than 310 species of birds, 25 mammals, 117 fishes and 65 amphibians and reptiles. The open water provides wintering areas for 23 species of migratory waterfowl and a year-round home for great blue herons, great egrets, wood storks, cormorants, brown pelicans and other species of marsh and shore birds.