One rare cat just made it a lot harder to slap down new neighborhoods in half of south Florida.

Florida has been in nonstop build mode for years. New neighborhoods, new roads, new plazas, all marching out into what used to be panther country. Now the panthers are making a serious comeback, and that’s starting to mess with how easy it is to get stuff built.
Developers are running head first into new wildlife rules tied to panther protections. Some of the changes are huge. Others are weird little restrictions that no one saw coming until a project got delayed. Either way, if you are trying to build in south Florida right now, you are probably having to work around this cat. Here are nine ways panthers are forcing builders to rethink how they do just about everything.