Environmental Learning Center on Wabasso Island

The Environmental Learning Center on Wabasso Island is open Monday to Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and on weekends from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., with adult admission of $10.

The ELC lists its campus admission and hours on its visitor page and repeats them on its home page. Visitors check in at the Welcome Center at 255 Live Oak Drive, Vero Beach, FL 32963, and the phone number is 772-589-5050.

Reservations are not required for general admission, and the ELC suggests allowing 2 to 3 hours for the boardwalk trails, aquariums, touch tank and nature play areas (ELC). Boat tours, kayak rentals and some programs are paid and booked separately.

A timing tip: the touch tank in the Living Lagoon building is open only from 10 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 3 p.m. (ELC), so a family arriving at opening or after 3 p.m. on a Saturday will see the aquariums but not the hands-on tank. Paths include mulch, grass, steps and uneven ground in places, and the ELC asks visitors who need a step-free route to call the Welcome Center first (ELC).

Last verified: October 14, 2026, on the Environmental Learning Center website.

The Environmental Learning Center is on Wabasso Island in the Indian River Lagoon with a Vero Beach address, and its one departure point in Sebastian is the Dale Wimbrow Park boat ramp on Roseland Road.

The ELC describes itself as located on Wabasso Island in Vero Beach (ELC venue rentals) and calls the grounds its 64-acre lagoon island campus, with boardwalks, mulched trails, docks and shaded picnic areas (ELC). Visitors check in at the Welcome Center at 255 Live Oak Drive.

For Sebastian residents the more convenient ELC trip is often the one that does not start on Wabasso Island at all: the seasonal St. Sebastian River Boat Tour meets by the dock at Dale Wimbrow Park, 11805 Roseland Road, Sebastian (ELC boat tours).

Dale Wimbrow Park is an Indian River County park open daily 7:30 a.m. to sunset, and county rules ban pets and alcohol there (Indian River County), which matters for anyone bringing a dog along to a river tour departure.

The ELC runs two hour Pelican Island tours from $40, a Sebastian Inlet tour from $45 and a seasonal St. Sebastian River tour from Sebastian at $60 per adult, all booked in advance.

Prices and details come from the ELC boat tour page. ELC members pay less on each tour, and listed prices do not include FareHarbor fees for online booking.

The Pelican Island tour gives an up-close look at Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge, a protected bird rookery. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service records that President Theodore Roosevelt designated the island the nation's first national wildlife refuge in 1903, when it covered 5.5 acres (USFWS). The Feathers and Fins trip goes to Sebastian Inlet, where the ELC says over 370 species of birds are seen (ELC).

The St. Sebastian River tour is offered during the cooler season for manatee viewing, with alligators and birds along the way (ELC). Every boat tour ticket includes campus admission, even for the river tour that starts in Sebastian, so a river tour ticket also carries campus admission on Wabasso Island.

Booking rules are strict. Guests should arrive 30 minutes before departure; cancellations within 48 hours are nonrefundable, earlier ones cost $10 per person, and the ELC may cancel for weather or if fewer than six passengers book (ELC). Private guided kayak tours, available every day, start at $140 (ELC paddle page).

The 64-acre ELC campus on Wabasso Island has an air-conditioned aquarium hall called the Living Lagoon, boardwalk and mulched trails through mangroves, docks on the lagoon and a native plant nursery.

The Living Lagoon holds 2,000 gallons of aquaria with native Indian River Lagoon species such as mangrove snapper, puffer and sheepshead, a 145-gallon touch tank with sea stars, horseshoe crabs and sea urchins, an active indoor beehive and a full-size manatee skeleton (ELC).

Outside, trails lead past an osprey nest and through the mangroves, and the ELC streams two osprey nest webcams. The ELC points to the rare Atala butterfly along its trails and sells native plants at its Native Plant Nook (ELC). The ELC adds that the lagoon around its island holds more than 4,300 species of plants and animals, 36 of them endangered or rare.

Campus rules are the ELC's own. Wabasso Island is a pet-free, smoke-free and vape-free campus, and single-use plastics, glitter, balloons and Styrofoam are not allowed (ELC). Shaded picnic areas are available, and visitors are asked to pack out their trash.

Pelican Island Audubon Society members founded the Environmental Learning Center in 1988, after the Indian River County Commission agreed in 1987 to lease public land for it.

The ELC history page records that the county lease came with a condition: the ELC had to raise the money to operate the center for public use. The Indian River County School Board agreed to send elementary school students to the ELC once it opened (ELC history). Founders George Bunnell (1924 to 2005) and Maggy Bowman (1914 to 2006) are honored on the page, and the Maggy Bowman Scholarship Fund helps pay for programs and summer camps.

The ELC lists Young Explorers for PreK to first grade at $15 per student, Splash for second and third grade at $20, and Lagoon Days for fourth through twelfth grade at $30, with seine netting and a mangrove marsh walk; it states that all activities meet Florida's Education Standards (ELC field trips).