Llewellyn M. "Doc" Ehrhart

Llewellyn (Llew) Ehrhart Jr., known by many as “Doc,” was born in Dallastown, Pennsylvania, on April 22, 1942, and died at home in Oviedo, Florida, on March 3, 2022. He was 79. He is survived by his twin daughters, Ashley Ehrhart (Oviedo) and Samantha “Mandy” Silver (husband Andrew, Winter Springs). He was preceded in death by his parents, Thelma and Llewellyn Ehrhart Sr., his brother, Wendell, and his beloved wife of 53 years, Carol. A son of small-town grocery store owners, Doc met Carol at church camp when they were 13 years old, and they were married upon his graduation from Franklin & Marshall College. The two then moved to Ithaca, NY, where Doc pursued his PhD in zoology at Cornell University. After five bitter winters, they moved to Florida so Doc could continue his small mammal studies as a faculty member at the newly minted Florida Technological University (now UCF). But when he encountered the enormous sea turtles nesting on the beaches of Kennedy Space Center, he knew he’d found his calling. During more than 30 years as a UCF professor and researcher, Doc developed the university’s respected marine turtle research program. And, after countless late nights tagging turtles on the beach and early mornings surveying nests with his devoted students, Doc (call sign: “Rattlesnake”) considered it the accomplishment of a lifetime when data from his project was instrumental in the establishment of the Archie Carr National Wildlife Refuge in 1991. Today, the refuge’s 20 miles of coastline, stretching from Melbourne Beach to Wabasso Beach along Florida’s east coast, have seen a dramatic resurgence of threatened and endangered species, and host about one quarter of all sea turtle nesting in the United States. Doc was a life-long swimmer, who in recent years turned to bicycling, enjoying nothing more than biking all around Oviedo and adjacent Black Hammock, greeting neighbors and counting species of native vertebrates he encountered along the way. He was in all things a traditionalist yet a groundbreaker, a naturalist and a conservationist, a field biologist who enjoyed getting dirty but cleaned up well, a teller of one particularly bad joke that only he thought was hilarious, and a much-loved husband, father, teacher, mentor, and friend. The family is planning a private memorial celebration of Doc’s life, with details to be determined. The family of Llewellyn (Llew) Ehrhart Jr. invites you to leave a message of condolence on the Tribute Wall created in his loving memory.

Llewellyn M. "Doc" Ehrhart

April 22, 1942 - March 3, 2022