Category Archives: creeks

Clean Withlacoochee, Alapaha, Santa Fe Rivers; dirty Sugar Creek and One Mile Branch, filthy Hightower Creek 2025-12-04

Update 2025-12-13: Clean Rivers and Creeks, except Hightower Creek 2025-12-11.

The Withlacoochee River tested pretty clean this week, as did the Alapaha and Santa Fe Rivers.

But One Mile Branch and Sugar Creek tested dirty, and Hightower Creek tested filthy.

It appears there is still some other source of sewage upstream of St. Augustine Road into Hightower Creek.

No new sewage spills have been reported in the past week for the Suwannee River Basin in Florida or Georgia.

The weather prediction for Saturday and Sunday is rain.

So if you can find a river with enough water, and you don’t mind cold and rain, happy paddling, motoring, swimming, and fishing this weekend.

This image is an overview. Scroll down for the details.

[Clean Withlacoochee, Alapaha, & Santa Fe Rivers 2025-12-04, Dirty Sugar Creek & One Mile Branch, Filthy Hightower Creek]
Clean Withlacoochee, Alapaha, & Santa Fe Rivers 2025-12-04, Dirty Sugar Creek & One Mile Branch, Filthy Hightower Creek

Sugar Creek and its feeder creeks

We’re only seeing these creek results from Valdosta Utilities because they’re in the fourth week of the month 12 required testing after their November 2024 sewage spills. There won’t be any more tests in that series after this week.

https://www.valdostacity.com/utilities/river-stream-water-quality-data/nov-2024-overflow-testing-results

Maybe it’s time for Valdosta to take up a more regular schedule for testing its creeks, as well as the Withlacoochee River both upstream and down. This would be to the advantage of the City of Valdosta, because such results help find sewage spills, and they also demonstrate when the creeks and rivers are clean, and when there are problems that are not Valdosta’s fault.

WWALS tester Suzy Hall got 566 cfu/100 mL E. coli at the WaterGoat on Sugar Creek, down near the Withlacoochee River. Which matches the 600 Valdosta Utilities got a bit upstream at Gornto Road. Both results are above the one-time 410 test limit.

Farther upstream, Continue reading →

Draft reissuance Tifton wastewater permit –GA-EPD 2025-11-30

This draft update to the wastewater permit for the Tifton Regional Wastewater Treatment Complex (TRWTC) tightens some pollution limits, adds others, and adds some testing and reporting.

However, I don’t see any thing about PFAS or other forever chemicals.

What do you see that needs comment to the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (GA-EPD)?

[Draft reissuance of Tifton wastewater permit, NPDES Permit No. GA0048470, Outflow: New River --GA-EPD]
Draft reissuance of Tifton wastewater permit, NPDES Permit No. GA0048470, Outflow: New River –GA-EPD

The GA-EPD notice about this reissuance arrived via email today, with the document online here with a copy on the WWALS website.

Images of each page are below.

I hadn’t really noticed this biosolids sludge farm before: Continue reading →

Clearing logjams from Sugar Creek –Juston Stone 2025-12-02

Update 2025-12-05: Clean Withlacoochee, Alapaha, Santa Fe Rivers; dirty Sugar Creek and One Mile Branch 2025-12-04.

This week there are many less deadfalls across Sugar Creek in Valdosta, Georgia.

[Clearing logjams from Sugar Creek --Juston Stone 2025-11-02, Stones Aquatic Weed & Algae Removal, for Valdosta Utilities Department]
Clearing logjams from Sugar Creek –Juston Stone 2025-11-02, Stones Aquatic Weed & Algae Removal, for Valdosta Utilities Department

Juston Stone sent these pictures. He is the owner of Stones Aquatic Weed & Algae Removal. He said he was hired by Valdosta Utilities Department to clear from the bottom of the Salty Snapper property up to the Gornto Road Bridge. Downstream from there is not in the Valdosta City Limits. It’s not far downstream to the Withlacoochee River, which has plenty of logjams of its own. Yes, there are discussions about that.

Juston also posted this video of Sugar Creek clearing:
https://www.facebook.com/reel/2037502813683473/

There are more videos on the Stones Aquatic facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/stonespondcleaning/

Valdosta Utilities Director Jason Barnes had been saying for some time that he had some creek clearing projects in mind. I guess this was one of them.

Juston said when they cleared one of the biggest logjams, Continue reading →

Where does this little creek by Knights Ferry Boat Ramp come from? 2205-11-22

Update 2025-12-02: Pictures: Tire, rim, antique bottles, pull-top cans, traffic cone, RCA TV, and wasp nest from Withlacoochee River, KF to Nankin 2025-11-12.

It was running a steady stream even though the Withlacoochee River was very low, when we set out to paddle from Knights Ferry Boat Ramp to Clyattville-Nankin Boat Ramp on Saturday, November 22, 2025.

Scotti Jay first asked this question: What is the source of this creek’s water?

[Where does this little creek by Knights Ferry Boat Ramp come from? Is it from a spring?]
Where does this little creek by Knights Ferry Boat Ramp come from? Is it from a spring?

Here’s a video of this little creek running:

https://www.facebook.com/Wwalswatershed/videos/2640393432991196

https://youtu.be/3Ws6mzlmWcs Continue reading →

Clean Withlacoochee River, Mostly Clean Sugar Creek 2025-11-26

Update 2025-12-05: Clean Withlacoochee, Alapaha, Santa Fe Rivers; dirty Sugar Creek and One Mile Branch 2025-12-04.

Update 2025-12-05: Clearing logjams from Sugar Creek –Juston Stone 2025-12-02.

Even upstream, the Withlacoochee River tested pretty clean this week.

And Sugar Creek and its feeder creeks tested pretty clean, except at Gornto Road.

This is according to Valdosta Utilities results, which match the weekend results previously reported from WWALS testers.

Apparently the effects of the small Valdosta sewage spill into Sugar Creek Wednesday last week have washed out of the Withlacoochee River downstream.

This image is an overview. Scroll down for the details.

[Clean Withlacoochee River, Mostly Clean Sugar Creek, No new sewage spills, No rain 2025-11-26]
Clean Withlacoochee River, Mostly Clean Sugar Creek, No new sewage spills, No rain 2025-11-26

No new sewage spills have been reported in the Suwannee River Basin in Florida or Georgia since the small Valdosta spill into Sugar Creek on Wednesday, November 11, 2025.

No rain is predicted until Tuesday.

So if you can find enough water, happy paddling, motoring, swimming, and fishing this weekend.

Follow this link for the WWALS composite spreadsheet of water quality results rainfall and sewage spills in the Suwannee River Basin in Georgia and Florida:
https://wwals.net/issues/testing/#results

The image below is a current excerpt from that spreadsheet.

[Chart: Clean Withlacoochee River, Mostly Clean Sugar Creek 2025-11-26]
Chart: Clean Withlacoochee River, Mostly Clean Sugar Creek 2025-11-26 Continue reading →

WWALS teaching ABAC students about water quality @ GFEC 2025-11-21

Heather Brasell got WWALS water quality testing trainer Gretchen Quarterman invited to talk about water quality with students from Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College (ABAC). They did this in the classroom at the Gaskins Forest Education Center (GFEC) and onsite at streams coming from the Town of Alapaha Wastewater Treatment Plant.

[WWALS teaching ABAC students about water quality @ GFEC, Watersheds and microbes, plants and animals 2025-11-21]
WWALS teaching ABAC students about water quality @ GFEC, Watersheds and microbes, plants and animals 2025-11-21

They did the classroom part at Gaskins Forest Education Center (GFEC), 3359 Moore Sawmill Rd, Alapaha, GA 31622, in Berrien County. Gretchen talked about what watersheds are, about the watersheds of the Suwannee River Basin, about WWALS, and generally about Georgia Adopt-A-Stream water quality testing such as WWALS does. Continue reading →

Clean Withlacoochee River downstream 2025-11-22

Update 2025-11-28: Clean Withlacoochee River, Mostly Clean Sugar Creek 2025-11-26.

Better news from two recent Withlacoochee River water quality samples.

Apparently the effects of the small Valdosta sewage spill into Sugar Creek Wednesday have washed out of the Withlacoochee River downstream, at least where we tested.

Suzy Hall got zero (0) E. coli for Friday at State Line Boat Ramp, aka Mozell Spells.

John S. Quarterman got 100 cfu/100 mL for Saturday nine miles upstream at Clyattville-Nankin Boat Ramp.

Those are both less than the 126 cfu/100 mL three-test average limit, so quite clean.

This image is an overview. Scroll down for the details.

[Clean downstream Withlacoochee River, State Line 2025-11-21, Nankin Boat Ramp 2025-11-22]
Clean downstream Withlacoochee River, State Line 2025-11-21, Nankin Boat Ramp 2025-11-22

Nankin Boat Ramp is also 15 river miles downstream from US 84 and 27 miles downstream from GA 133 where Valdosta Utilities got way-too-high E. coli for Thursday. And about 30 miles downstream from Sugar Creek, where WWALS tester Suzy Hall got even worse Too Numerous to Count (TNTC) for Wednesday.

These new WWALS results match the zero (0) that WWALS tester Russ Tatum got for Wednesday at Holly Point, on the Withlacoochee River in Florida a few miles upstream from the Suwannee River.

So if you can find enough water, happy paddling, motoring, swimming, and fishing, at least downstream on the Withlacoochee River.

Follow this link for the WWALS composite spreadsheet of water quality results rainfall and sewage spills in the Suwannee River Basin in Georgia and Florida:
https://wwals.net/issues/testing/#results

The image below is a current excerpt from that spreadsheet. Continue reading →

Where does southwest Waycross drain? 2025-11-23

According to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the Suwannee River Basin starts in Waycross, Georgia, around a line south down Gibbs Street, east on Walker Road, south on Gilmore Street, south down Swamp Road, then east along Washington Drive.

[Where does southwest Waycross drain? Through Lees Branch, into Middle Fork, Suwannee River]
Where does southwest Waycross drain? Through Lees Branch, into Middle Fork, Suwannee River

But what about the drainage canal you can see running southwest from Brunel Street across Gibbs Street?

Looks to me like that goes into the Suwannee River Basin.

People who live in Waycross, tell me if I got this right.

[Map: SW from Brunel Street --SRWT 2025-11-23]
Map: SW from Brunel Street on the WWALS map of the Suwannee River Water Trail (SRWT).

North across Washington Street, there is a network of ditches that drains into Caney Branch into the Satilla River. Continue reading →

Videos: Bradford Road Denied @ Berrien County Commission 2025-11-04

The Berrien County Commission denied the subdividing issue before them: the six lots on Bradford Road, at their November 4, 2025, regular meeting.

However, many irregularities were raised.

[Bradford Road Denied @ Berrien County Commission. Many irregularities raised, 2025-11-04]
Bradford Road Denied @ Berrien County Commission. Many irregularities raised, 2025-11-04

The other lots on Old Valdosta Highway were already decided by the same Commission in 2024, and the minutes for that meeting say at the request of John and Tonia Beville.

At this meeting, John Beville said he and she had not requested that, and never saw any Public Hearing signs posted, even though they lived there at the time. When questioned by the Commission, Zoning Coordinator Teresa Willis said it was done for South Auction, and “Russ” brought the plat to her. She did not say who Russ was.

Della Gladieux pointed out that the three Planning Commission Public Hearings this year all had both plats advertised, for the lots on Old Valdosta Highway, and for the other lots on Bradford Road. She also pointed out other issues in the document she handed the Commissioners: Formal Complaint and Demand for Investigation Re Bradford Road –Della Gladieux 2025-11-04.

Lisa Sumner also spelled out numerous issues.

Below you can see the entire Berrien County Commission meeting of November 4, 2025 in the WWALS videos of each agenda item and speaker, plus a few still pictures, followed by a WWALS video playlist.

See also Continue reading →

Valdosta sewage spill into Sugar Creek –WCTV 2025-11-20

Update 2025-11-25: Clean Withlacoochee River downstream 2025-11-22.

The WCTV report includes:

Earlier this year, the North Florida Rivers Task Force met with Valdosta leaders about several spills along the same water way.

One riverkeeper said he wants to see more improvements.

[Valdosta sewage spill into Sugar Creek, Suwannee Riverkeeper --WCTV 2025-11-20]
Valdosta sewage spill into Sugar Creek, Suwannee Riverkeeper –WCTV 2025-11-20

“The positive side is they seem to be getting smaller, so that is good,” executive director of [WWALS Watershed Coalition] John Quarterman said. “Valdosta utilities fixed it pretty quick and they put out a press release as well, in less than 24 hours, so that is good. Of course, nobody is going to be happy until there are no more sewage spills.”

See Mishalynn Brown, WCTV, Nov. 20, 2025, Sewage spill reported in Sugar Creek, Valdosta utilities says: The utilities department advised that residents avoid the area.

Thanks to WCTV producer Michael Clark for interviewing me via zoom. I must work on my halo.

The WCTV report starts by reviewing the Valdosta press release, which Continue reading →