Adena Springs Ranch is the former name of a 30,000-acre cattle ranch in Florida's Marion County now known as Sleepy Creek Ranch Lands. [1] Adena Ranches is a related cattle ranch property in Levy County. Both are owned by Canadian billionaire Frank Stronach.
Florida is the southernmost contiguous state in the United States. The state is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, and to the south by the Straits of Florida. Florida is the 22nd-most extensive, the 3rd-most populous, and the 8th-most densely populated of the U.S. states. Jacksonville is the most populous municipality in the state and the largest city by area in the contiguous United States. The Miami metropolitan area is Florida's most populous urban area. Tallahassee is the state's capital.
Marion County is a county located in the U.S. state of Florida. As of the 2010 census, the population was 331,298. Its county seat is Ocala.
Frank Stronach, is an Austrian and Canadian businessman and politician.
Sleepy Creek Ranch Lands (formerly Adena Springs Ranch) is located near Gainesville. The first 24,000 acres cost $62 million with another $18 million in expenditures expected. The ranch is expected to produce all-natural, hormone-free, grass-fed beef cattle on the once wooded property, in part to supply a planned chain of restaurants. Stronach has indicated that 40 percent of the land would remain wooded for commercial timber. [2] A $30 million, 61,000-square-foot abattoir is also part of the plan as well as a biomass energy plant to power it. [3] Concerns have been raised over water usage plans and how springs (including the artesian Silver Springs of Silver Springs, Florida) will be affected. Flow from Silver Springs has already dropped by 50% in the past few years due to an ongoing drought. [3] [4] Stronach has filed for a permit to pump more than 13 million gallons of water from the Floridan aquifer daily from the St. Johns River Water Management District. This is more than the city of Ocala uses for its 150,000 people. [5]
Gainesville is the county seat and largest city in Alachua County, Florida, United States, and the principal city of the Gainesville, Florida Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). The population of Gainesville in the 2017 US Census estimates was 132,249, a 6.4% growth from 2010. Gainesville is the largest city in the region of North Central Florida. It is also a component of the Gainesville-Lake City Combined Statistical Area, which had a 2013 population of 337,925.
A hormone is any member of a class of signaling molecules produced by glands in multicellular organisms that are transported by the circulatory system to target distant organs to regulate physiology and behavior. Hormones have diverse chemical structures, mainly of three classes: eicosanoids, steroids, and amino acid/protein derivatives. The glands that secrete hormones comprise the endocrine signaling system. The term hormone is sometimes extended to include chemicals produced by cells that affect the same cell or nearby cells.
Silver Springs is an unincorporated community in Marion County, Florida, United States. It is the site of Silver Springs, a group of artesian springs and a historic tourist attraction that is now part of Silver Springs State Park. The community is part of the Ocala metropolitan area.
Stronach is also developing an upscale golf course community (Ocala Meadows Farms) at U.S. 441 and State Road 326. The $60 million development is the most recent venture for the founder Magna International and former owner thoroughbred horse racing tracks in Florida, Maryland and California. [3]
A golf course community is a type of residential housing development built around a golf course.
State Road 326 is an east–west route in Marion County, Florida, in and around Ocala. The western terminus is at I-75 exit 358, and its eastern end is at State Road 40 east of Silver Springs. The highway acts as a bypass around Ocala, taking traffic to SR 40 on the edge of the Ocala National Forest.
Magna International Inc. is a Canadian global automotive supplier headquartered in Aurora, Ontario. In 2014, Magna became the largest automobile parts manufacturer in North America by sales of original equipment parts, and one of Canada's largest companies. Its operating groups include Magna Steyr, Magna Powertrain, Magna Exteriors, Magna Seating, Magna Closures, Magna Mirrors, Magna Electronics and Cosma International.
Stronach has donated money to the area's Fort McCoy School [6] and $1.5 million to establish the Frank Stronach Plant Science Center at the University of Florida. The facility includes a 5,380-square-foot multipurpose building and an adjoining 7,000-square-foot open pavilion at the university’s research farm in Citra, Florida.
The University of Florida is a public land-grant, sea-grant, and space-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida. The university traces its origins to 1853 and has operated continuously on its Gainesville campus since September 1906.
Citra is an unincorporated community in Marion County, Florida, United States. The community is part of the Ocala Metropolitan Statistical Area. Citra is known as the home of the pineapple orange, a name coined in 1883 for an orange (fruit) with an aroma reminiscent of the pineapple.
