Tag Archives: Suwannee River

Videos: Geography of Opportunity, by Vickie Everitte, a WWALS Webinar, 2025-12-11

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History Instructor Vickie Everitte conducted a historical exploration of Georgia’s Wiregrass Region and the complex stories of survival, resistance, and adaptation that unfolded there after the 1814 Treaty of Fort Jackson.

WWALS Board Member Janet Martin gave a brief introduction to this WWALS Webinar. Questions and answers were at the end, including a distinguished guest.

[Geography of Opportunity, by Vickie Everitte, a WWALS Webinar, 2025-12-11]
Geography of Opportunity, by Vickie Everitte, a WWALS Webinar, 2025-12-11

Here is a zoom video of this WWALS Webinar:

https://youtu.be/ULUwKQEOh10

Her slides are on the WWALS website in PowerPoint and PDF. Images of each page are below.

Native American and Passageways to Freedom within the Wiregrass Region1

As settlers moved south of the Oconee River, drawn by the land’s economic promise, waves of migration and militia efforts reshaped the landscape—and the lives of the Native American families who called it home. Through rivers, streams, and the vast Okefenokee Swamp, Indigenous people found ways not only to endure but to carve out paths of freedom and self-determination amid the U.S. Indian Removal Policy of the 1830s.

Drawing from original correspondence between settlers, militia, and Georgia’s governors in Milledgeville, this presentation reveals how waterways became corridors of escape and survival. As Everitte reminds us, “Swamps are places on the margins — as much, they are places of transition, opportunity, and challenge.”2

About the Speaker

Continue reading →

Outfall from Pilgrims Pride chicken plant into Suwannee River 2025-12-20

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Merrillee Malwitz-Jipson offered to show me where the Pilgrims Pride Outflow pipe discharges wastewater into the Suwannee River from the chicken processing plant on US 90, near Suwannee River State Park.

While there, I took water quality samples upstream from the pipe, from the end of the pipe, and downstream from the pipe. The results are zero E. coli upstream and downstream, and 33 cfu/100 mL from the end of the pipe, which is also very clean.

We observed no outflow from the pipe. But maybe they just don’t send anything through the pipe on weekends. According to EPA ECHO, that pipe has exceeded its mercury allowance recently; more on that later.

[Pilgrims Pride chicken plant outfall into Suwannee River 2025-12-20, Clean samples, but permitted for 1.5 MGD]
Pilgrims Pride chicken plant outfall into Suwannee River 2025-12-20, Clean samples, but permitted for 1.5 MGD

The Pilgrims Pride wastewater permit No. FL0001465-008-IW7A still (as of 2020) allows up to 1.50 million gallons per day (MGD) “monthly average daily flow”.

The final treated effluent which includes process wastewater and non-process wastewater discharges to Suwannee River (Class III fresh Water, WBID 3422B). The permittee is also authorized to land apply 0.040 MGD of sludge to a sprayfield system. The facility is located at latitude 30° 22′ 18.99″ N, longitude 83° 9′ 29.85″ W, on 19740 US Highway 90, Live Oak, Florida 32060-8753 in Suwannee County.

Merrillee explained all that. Continue reading →

Ellaville Hike, Withlacoochee River 2026-02-07

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Hike to the Drew Mansion Site, the Historic Hillman Bridge across the Suwannee River, Suwannacoochee Spring, and maybe up the Withlacoochee River a bit just to take a look.

When: Gather 9 AM, launch 9:30 AM, end 1 PM, Saturday, February 7, 2026

Put In: Town of Ellaville site, 596 NE Drew Way, Lee, FL 32059

GPS: 30.386812, -83.175257

[Ellaville Hike, Withlacoochee River, Drew Mansion 2026-02-07, Historic Hillman Bridge, Suwannacoochee Spring]
Ellaville Hike, Withlacoochee River, Drew Mansion 2026-02-07, Historic Hillman Bridge, Suwannacoochee Spring

Continue reading →

Water First North Florida wetland locations: unknown –SRWMD 2025-12-17

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Here’s a bit more about the Water First North Florida (WFNF) billion dollar project to pipe treated wastewater from Jacksonville into the Suwannee River Basin.

The Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD) seems to know surprisingly little about this joint project with the St Johns River Water Management District (SJRWMD).

They don’t know where the water would go into wetlands to “clean” it up some more, and they don’t know where it would go to infiltrate into the Floridan Aquifer.

They don’t have a pilot study and they don’t have wetland site assessments.

Turns out there are a couple of reasons why SRWMD does not know or have those things. But I have found out a few things.

And I have leads to find out much more.

[Water First North Florida wetland locations: unknown, No Pilot Study or Wetland Assessments, But here is the RFQ --SRWMD]
Water First North Florida wetland locations: unknown, No Pilot Study or Wetland Assessments, But here is the RFQ –SRWMD

Back on July 8, 2025, SRWMD Deputy Executive Director of Water Resources Amy Brown gave her board a Lower Santa Fe and Ichetucknee Project Update. It included a few slides on the WFNF, aka North Florida Regional Recharge Project. Continue reading →

Drought Workshop Presentation –SRWMD 2025-12-09

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Update 2025-12-18: Water First North Florida wetland locations: unknown –SRWMD 2025-12-17.

In their Drought Conditions Workshop on December 9, 2025, SRWMD talked about starting an outreach campaign, “highlighting the water deficit that we are in, and our drought, and the need for efficiency, and here are some possible measures that you could implement, from a voluntary standpoint.”

But they are not yet willing to declare even the statutory Water Shortage Warning or Advisory, which has only voluntary measures.

[Drought Workshop Presentation --SRWMD 2025-12-09, No water withdrawal limits yet, Maybe an outreach campaign soon]
Drought Workshop Presentation –SRWMD 2025-12-09, No water withdrawal limits yet, Maybe an outreach campaign soon

If the current drought is not severe enough to warrant even a statutory Warning, why are SRWMD and SJRWMD forging ahead with their billion-dollar Water First North Florida project to pipe treated Jacksonville wastewater into the Suwannee River Basin to recharge the Floridan Aquifer here? And what is being done to remove the PFAS, drugs, and articifical sweeteners that typically pass right through wastewater treatment?

Thanks to SRWMD Board members Charles Keith, Larry Sessions, and William Lloyd, they did talk about possibly instituing limits on water withdrawals, considering that the past 10 years have been the hottest on record.

The presenter, Amy Brown, Deputy Executive Director, Water Resources, was clear that they have not even advised voluntary limits for the biggest group of users, which are in agriculture.

Her slides, received from SRWMD in response to a WWALS public records request, are on the WWALS website, with images below in this post.

SRWMD Executive Director Hugh Thomas did note that the water withdrawal permits SRWMD issues have standard conditions that can require limits on water withdrawals. But “it’s never fun to engage with the permittee and say, hey, you’re going to have to cut back because we’re in a water shortage period.”

You can see Amy Brown, Deputy Executive Director, Water Resources, present these slides to the SRWMD Board in their own video of their December 9, 2025, Workshop, at 1:45:58:

https://www.youtube.com/live/6LDIIdFqxaY?si=LnRZUqNL0imphDJz&t=6358

What about reducing water withdrawals?

At 2:14:10, you can hear Charles Keith asking about increasing drought. Continue reading →

Okefenokee Swamp exchanges water with the Floridan Aquifer –peer-reviewed evidence 2025-12-09

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Update 2025-12-26: WWALS Webinar via zoom: Okefenokee Swamp leaks into the Floridan Aquifer, Prof. Evaristo & Rasmussen, 2026-01-15.

University of Georgia (UGA) Professor Todd C. Rasmussen is back after 30 years with peer-reviewed double evidence that the Okefenokee Swamp does exchange water with the underlying Floridan Aquifer from which we all drink in south Georgia and north Florida.

[Okefenokee Swamp leaks water into the Floridan Aquifer --peer-reviewed evidence 2025-12-09, Mining withdrawals would make it worse]
Okefenokee Swamp leaks water into the Floridan Aquifer –peer-reviewed evidence 2025-12-09, Mining withdrawals would make it worse

This paper is more incentive to pass Georgia House Bill 561 to protect the Okefenokee Swamp from mining, at least on its east side. Georgians, please ask your statehouse delegation to pass HB 561. Floridians, please ask your Georgia friends and relatives to do the same. Here’s how to contact Georgia Statehouse members:

https://wwals.net/about/elected-officials/georgia-house/

Here’s a video explaining the new paper by its first author Prof. Jaivime Evaristo, on YouTube, 2025-12-09, The Okefenokee is Not a Bathtub: A New Look at Wetland-Aquifer Coupling, Continue reading →

Old Stagecoach Road Bridge at Suwannee Springs 2025-12-12

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This is not the historic bridge you can see today at Suwannee Springs.

It’s the one before that. The clue is the columns holding it up. Also the spring wall holding water.

[Site of Stagecoach Road Bridge at Suwannee Springs 2025-12-12, Upstream from Historic 1931 Graffiti Bridge]
Site of Stagecoach Road Bridge at Suwannee Springs 2025-12-12, Upstream from Historic 1931 Graffiti Bridge

The Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD) posted this picture December 12, 2025. Continue reading →

Hydrologic Conditions Report –SRWMD 2025-11-30

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Update 2025-12-17: Drought Workshop Presentation –SRWMD 2025-12-09.

Every county in the Suwannee River Basin is in drought, according to SRWMD’s own Hydrologic Conditions Report for November 30, 2025 presented in their Board meeting of December 9, 2025.

But not droughty enough for SRWMD to declare even a voluntary Drought Warning, according to the Drought Workshop after the Board meeting. I have sent in a FOIA request for the Workshop slides. Both meetings are in the SRWMD YouTube post for 2025-12-09.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LDIIdFqxaY

Meanwhile, here is the SRWMD Hydrologic Conditions Report for November 2025, plus some related information.

Such as SRWMD actually does have “Year-Round Lawn & Landscape Irrigation Measures,” but nobody seems to know about them. And that page does not seem to include agricultural, mining, or water bottling water use. Continue reading →

Packet: SRWMD Board plus Workshop on Drought Conditions 2025-12-09

Update 2025-12-17: Drought Workshop Presentation –SRWMD 2025-12-09.

Update 2025-12-14: Hydrologic Conditions Report –SRWMD 2025-11-30.

Maybe you’d like to come to the Workshop on “Drought Conditions and Review of the District’s Water Shortage Process” that the Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD) is holding. That’s this Tuesday, December 9, 2025, at 9 AM in Live Oak, after the SRWMD Board meeting.

If I’m not mistaken, a drought declaration by the Suwannee River Water Management District would mean numerous water withdrawal permit holders would have to reduce their withdrawals.

[Packet: SRWMD Board, Live Oak, FL 2025-12-09, plus Workshop on Drought Conditions]
Packet: SRWMD Board, Live Oak, FL 2025-12-09, plus Workshop on Drought Conditions

Also, Board agenda item 26. Water Resources Division Updates, will probably include an update on the Water First North Florida billion-dollar aquifer recharge project. It would pipe treated wastewater from Jacksonville to wetlands in the Suwannee River Basin, and from there into sinks to recharge Ichetucknee Headspring and maybe others. Limiting water withdrawals would be less expensive and more effective, without risking contaminating our springs and aquifers with PFAS and other chemicals that wastewater treatment does not remove.

Two weeks ago I asked, Why hasn’t SRWMD declared a drought yet?

Already then, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, the entire Suwannee River Basin in both Georgia and Florida was in drought.
https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/CurrentMap/StateDroughtMonitor.aspx?Southeast

Conditions have only gotten worse since then. Continue reading →

Suwannee River Sill and Mixons Hammock –Shirley Kokidko 2025-11-26

Here’s what the second and third gates in the Suwannee River Sill looked like a week after Shirley Kokidko’s Low water at the first gate, Suwannee River Sill, Okefenokee Swamp 2025-11-20. Plus a gator ambling down to the river, and Mixon’s Hammock, upstream towards Stephen C. Foster State Park.

[Suwannee River Sill, Okefenokee Swamp --Shirley Kokidko, Alligator, Second and Third Gates, and Mixons Hammock 2025-11-26]
Suwannee River Sill, Okefenokee Swamp –Shirley Kokidko, Alligator, Second and Third Gates, and Mixons Hammock 2025-11-26

Here are a few videos:

Remember, despite the Florida myth, the gates in the Suwannee River Sill are always open, since about 2001.

The third gate isn’t even a gate: it’s just a breach in that 4.5-mile earthen dam, so the North Fork of the Suwannee River can get through. The Sill was meant to keep water levels up in the Swamp to prevent wildfires, but it did not succeed. Also, it turns out wildfires are necessary for the Swamp’s vegetation to regenerate itself. So after a study starting in 1998 and a two-year trial period, the gates have always been open.

The current low water in the Swamp and in the Suwannee River is because we’re in a drought.

It rained a bit the last day or so, and more is predicted. But so far that has made almost no difference in the level of the Suwannee River at Fargo, GA.

Other rivers in the Suwannee River Basin also show almost no change. See Current River and Lake Levels by Florida’s Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD).
http://www.mysuwanneeriver.org/realtime/river-levels.php

There is a gauge at the Sill, but Continue reading →