Tag Archives: fishing

Rivers and mining: WWALS comments on Suwannee-Satilla Draft Regional Water Plan 2023-05-15

Sent yesterday as PDF, in response to the invitation to comment and before the May 24, 2023 meeting in Tifton of the Georgia Suwannee-Satilla Regional Water Planning Council.

[The WWALS letter and rivers and mines in and near the Suwannee River Basin]
The WWALS letter and rivers and mines in and near the Suwannee River Basin

May 15, 2023

To: Water Planning

Georgia Department of Natural Resources
water.planning@dnr.ga.gov

RE: WWALS Comments on SSRWPC Draft Regional Water Plan

Dear DNR,

Responding to your invitation to comment on the draft Regional Water Plans, I write to mention some omissions in the Suwannee-Satilla Regional Draft Water Plan of March 2023.

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Infected fish caught on the Alapaha River, Berrien County, Georgia 2023-04-19

Where to report:
https://wwals.net/report/

Update 2023-04-27: Name of the fisherman and the original poster, with link.

These fish pictures are getting shared around, and keep getting sent to Suwannee Riverkeeper. Here’s what the fish disease might be. If you see a fish like this, please stick it on ice and get it biopsied so you can know. Call us, so we can know, and we can help you find a lab.

I have provided some eye bleach for after you look at this picture.

[Infected fish 2023-04-19]
Infected fish 2023-04-19

The fish was caught in the Alapaha River in Berrien County, Georgia.

I’ve heard at least five theories for what is the problem with this fish, from most likely to least: Continue reading

Slightly earlier kayak raffle drawing for Big Tuna with paddle and seats 2022-12-07

Update 2022-12-07: Video: Kayak raffle winner @ Banks Lake Full Wolf Moon paddle 2022-12-07.

Due to the time change, the drawing will be slightly earlier, at 4:15 PM, still at Banks Lake Boat Ramp, just west of Lakeland, Georgia, before the Banks Lake Full Cold Moon Paddle, Wednesday, December 7, 2022.

You do not have to be present to win this Jackson Big Tuna fishing kayak with two seats, a paddle, and PFDs.

[Raffle kayak at Hahira Veterans Day Parade 2022-11-11]
Raffle kayak at Hahira Veterans Day Parade 2022-11-11

You do have to get at least one raffle ticket: Continue reading

Georgia National Hunting and Fishing Day at Paradise PFA 2022-09-24

This is not a WWALS event, but it sounds fun and we support it. Of the many specific events by GA-DNR Wildlife Resources Division, one is at Paradise Public Fishing Area in our Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail. That’s east of Tifton on US 82, near Enigma, in Berrien County, Georgia.

[Logo, Map]
Logo, Map

Since the voters approved it in 2006, Georgia has a right of hunting and fishing, in the state Bill of Rights, up there with freedom of speech:

Georgia Constitution, Article I, Section 1, Paragraph XXVIII, The tradition of fishing and hunting and the taking of fish and wildlife shall be preserved for the people and shall be managed by law and regulation for the public good.

Now we can add a Right to Clean Water so fish and wildlife (and people) will have a healthy environment in which to live.


NATIONAL HUNTING AND FISHING DAY IN GEORGIA
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 2022
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Kayak Raffle Jackson Kayak Big Tuna with paddle 2022-12-07

Update 2022-12-07: Video: Kayak raffle winner @ Banks Lake Full Wolf Moon paddle 2022-12-07.

Update 2022-11-13: Slightly earlier kayak raffle drawing for Big Tuna with paddle and seats 2022-12-07.

You could win this Jackson Kayak Big Tuna fishing kayak, with seats, paddles, and life jackets. Thanks to Frank and Sissy Norman for the generous donation. This gently used kayak has plenty of fun days ahead for the winner.

[Kayak, donors]
Kayak, donors

Kayak Raffle Tickets

The winner will be drawn December 7, 2022, at the Banks Lake Full Cold Moon Paddle. You do not have to be present to win. Proceeds go to support the activities and advocacy of WWALS.

Also thanks to Frank for Continue reading

Valdosta Mayor supports Recreational redesignation of rivers 2021-06-30

Maybe this letter will help GA-EPD to upgrade our waterways from Fishing to Recreational for tighter standards on contaminants.

[Water Trails, Mayor's Paddle, cleanups, $100 million sewer improvements, Troupville River Camp]
Water Trails, Mayor’s Paddle, cleanups, $100 million sewer improvements, Troupville River Camp
PDF

Letter, Valdosta Mayor to GA-EPD

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Upgrade Suwannee River Basin rivers to Recreational –WWALS to GA-EPD 2021-06-30

There are a couple of new things in what I sent on the deadline day, yesterday. (PDF)

  1. Funds are now available to buy the private land at the Little River Confluence with the Withlacoochee River, which was the main impediment to plans for the Troupville River Camp and Troupville River Park.
  2. Stakeholders in the One Valdosta-Lowndes initiative met and decided their number one community and economic development priority is: Troupville River Camp.

For what this is all about, see Calling for pictures of swimming, diving, rapids, tubing, water skiing, or surfing, Suwannee River Basin, Georgia.

[Rivers, Letter]
Rivers, Letter


June 30, 2021

To: EPD.Comments@dnr.ga.gov
Elizabeth Booth, Environmental Protection Division
Watershed Protection Branch,
Watershed Planning & Monitoring Program,
Suite 1152 East, 2 Martin Luther King, Jr., Dr., Atlanta, GA 30334

Re: Georgia Triennial Review of Water Quality Standards

Dear Ms. Booth,

Once again I would like to commend you and all the GA-EPD staff for your diligence in this Triennial Review process. I thank you for your consideration of the request by WWALS Watershed Coalition, Inc. (WWALS) to upgrade GA EPD’s designated use of the Little, Withlacoochee, Alapaha, and Suwannee Rivers, as well as Grand Bay WMA, Banks Lake NWR, and the Okefenokee NWR, from Fishing to Recreational, to set higher water quality standards for these bodies of water.

In the interests of saving you and me time, I will try to merely summarize the arguments I have already made, while adding some material you may not have previously seen.

Year-Round

As you know WWALS would prefer that redesignation applied uniformly, year-round. As you mentioned in the recent EPD zoom meeting on this subject, perhaps one reason Florida has all its rivers as Recreational by default is its climate. South Georgia, like north Florida (and unlike north Georgia) has a subtropical climate in which we are not surprised by 80-degree weather in January. People swim, dive, fish, and boat on our rivers year-round. Some people even prefer to be on and in the water in the winter because there are fewer insects. I have recently been reminded that local churches also use them for immersion baptisms, which can happen in any season of the year.

Recreational Data Spreadsheet

Per request of EPD, please find attached a Recreational Data Spreadsheet, which is also online here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1g9gLcNnbRx4H9djZAlKd1ZaB7zrlmDbz/view?usp=sharing

In that spreadsheet are examples of swimming and diving locations, including almost every boat ramp or landing, plus selected sandbars, beaches, and springs. Also included are a few examples of rapids. None of them are Class III, but at least two are Class II+, and as Gwyneth Moody pointed out on the recent zoom, people frequently capsize in those.

Included for every location in that spreadsheet is a link to further information, mostly to one of our three river trails (“blue trails”):

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Adel, GA, resolution, Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail 2018-01-16

Thanks again to the City of Adel for Resolution #18-02 that they passed on January 16, 2018, in support of the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail.

[Resolution and WLRWT Sign]
Resolution and WLRWT Sign

Also in the big image above you see a new sign for the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail. More on that, later.

For now, note that the sign has the new City of Adel logo on it. That logo and the signed resolution are courtesy of City Clerk Rhonda P. Rowe.

Resolution

The text of the resolution we published at the time.

Here is a signed and executed copy. Continue reading

Looking clean downstream, Withlacoochee River 2020-08-20

Update 2020-08-28: Good downstream, but recurring GA 133, Withlacoochee River 2020-08-27

WWALS testing Thursday got excellent results at State Line Boat Ramp: zero (0) cfu/100 mL E. coli, and only 33 at Nankin and Knights Ferry Boat Ramps. We have nothing new from Valdosta since Monday’s data, and nothing from Florida since Thursday a week ago. But the WWALS data says that so far as we know, the Withlacoochee River is good for boating, fishing, swimming, etc. this weekend.

[Fishing, map, charts, pictures]
Fishing, map, charts, pictures

There was no significant rain, except far up on the Little River at Tifton, and upriver on the Alapaha at Alapaha, Georgia.

[Looking clean, Knights Ferry, Nankin, State Line]
Looking clean, Knights Ferry, Nankin, State Line
For context and the entire WWALS composite spreadsheet of Georgia and Florida water quality testing results and rainfall, see: https://wwals.net/issues/testing/

So apparently nothing nasty washed into the Withlacoochee River, and State Line, Nankin, and Knights Ferry Boat Ramps are green on Swim Guide. I’ve left all the other Withlacoochee and Little River “beaches” Continue reading

More than 30 groups organize to save Okefenokee Swamp 2020-07-14

See also Suwannee Riverkeeper’s call last month for people to contact the Georgia governor and other elected officials.

[Okefenokee Protection Alliance (OPA)]
Okefenokee Protection Alliance (OPA)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (see also )

MORE THAN 30 GROUPS ORGANIZE TO SAVE OKEFENOKEE SWAMP

[OPA Logo]
OPA Logo

GEORGIA (July 14, 2020) More than 30 national, state, and local organizations have joined forces in the fight to protect the Okefenokee Swamp. The new coalition, known as the Okefenokee Protection Alliance (OPA), recently formed in response to a new and alarming threat to the Okefenokee in the form of proposed heavy mineral sands mining adjacent to the swamp.

In July 2019, Twin Pines Minerals, LLC, submitted a permit application to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) seeking authorization to mine the first phase of what would eventually become a 12,000-acre project abutting the southeast corner of the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge.

After the Corps was deluged with letters opposing the project, Twin Pines withdrew that application and submitted a second application to excavate a roughly 900-acre first phase of the mine. The Corps is now weighing whether to approve that second application. Twin Pines must also secure permission from the state of Georgia.

“The new Okefenokee Protection Alliance is the first collaborative effort to have an exclusive focus on the protection of what is arguably our country’s healthiest remaining wetland of significance,” says Christian Hunt, Southeast Program Representative for Defenders of Wildlife. “Everyone came together because of Twin Pines’ permit application, but by design we intend to be active over the long-term and address the present threat that we are dealing with today, as well as future threats that stand to compromise the Okefenokee.”

This week, the Okefenokee Protection Alliance introduced a new website and began urging citizens to write Georgia Governor Brian Kemp, asking him to protect Southeast Georgia’s international natural treasure.

“Just as we have reached out to folks to call on the Corps, we are reaching out to folks to call on Governor Kemp because it is not just the Corps that has a say,” says Rena Peck, Executive Director of the Georgia River Network. “We want Governor Kemp to stand with his constituents and all the citizens in Georgia who are concerned about the mine and ask the Corps for an Environmental Impact Statement.”

The Okefenokee has a long history of support from Georgia leaders. A similar proposal to mine near the Swamp in the 1990s was stopped when Gov. Zell Miller and others spoke out against it; in the 1970s, W.S. “Bill” Stuckey, Jr. who represented the 8th District of Georgia in Congress, successfully fought to designate portions of the swamp as a National Wilderness Area.

Stuckey, now a resident of the Georgia coast, said recently, “I’m hopeful that Governor Kemp will step in to protect the Okefenokee Wilderness and stop the mine.”

OPA member organizations and federal agencies have expressed concerns that the mine could alter the hydrology of the area and impair the movement and storage of water within the swamp, the St. Marys and Suwannee rivers and the Floridan Aquifer.

This could lead to an increased risk of uncontrollable wildfires and impact access to the swamp for boating, fishing, birding, hunting and photography. Pollution from the mining operation could also impact the health of groundwater and surface water.

The Floridan Aquifer, which lies beneath the swamp, is the water source for all of south Georgia and most of Florida, and feeds many springs in the region, which are already adversely affected by overpumping. Thus, anything that affects the swamp or the aquifer could have far-reaching consequences.

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