ABSTRACT Tree islands, forested islands in an herbaceous freshwater wetland landscape, are a major landscape feature in the Florida Everglades. The vegetation communities on the heads of 31 tree islands, including eight islands with recreational camp structures, were assessed throughout Water Conservation Area 3 to determine their composition, structure, and distribution across the landscape. The islands were a sample of the most elevated islands in the local landscape. Measures of forest canopy (> 3 m) and sub-canopy (1–3 m) structure and composition, including cover, species richness, number of exotics, and total canopy basal area were ordinated onto six hydrologic variables estimated from the South Florida Water Management Model (v5.5) simulation from 1984 to 1997, and history of recent fire. Ordination allowed identification of four island groups: Group A, higher islands, most with camp structures, low or no canopy structure, high level of fire history, driest hydrology, and largest number of exotic s...