Good news for the WWALS cleanup 8AM this morning at Troupville Boat Ramp at GA 133 on the Little River: low E. coli and fecal coliform recently at the GA 133 Little River bridge.
In our weekly open records requests, we have gotten from Valdosta their water quality data through Wednesday of last week, October 3, 2018. It will be even more encouraging if Continue reading
Here is most of a year’s river water quality testing data from the city of Valdosta, on a Water Reporter map:
Click on any of the colored diamonds for graphs. Scroll right to see more graphs. Click on any graph to see every datapoint. Clearly fecal coliform (FCOLI) and E. coli (ECOLI) have significant spikes way beyond the Georgia state limit of 200 cfu/100 ml.
However, as we already saw on the spill followup data map, often, even usually, FCOLI and ECOLI are just as bad or worse upstream Continue reading
Here is (at least some of) the water quality testing data Valdosta was required to collect after its major spills of June in the Withlacoochee River basin and August in the Alapaha River basin. Maybe Valdosta is right that neither of these spills got into waterways, but something sure did, according to this data. Curiously, in both cases the worst fecal coliform readings were upstream from the spill location.
Downstream at Johnson Road on Mud Creek from
the Mud Creek WTP after the August spill
Update 2018-04-10: Canoeing from the Little to the Chee by Burt Kornegay 2018-03-24.
![[Phil Hubbard interviews Burt Kornegay]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2018-03-24--burt-kornegay/sddefault.jpg)
Very experienced retired outfitter Burt Kornegay from western north Carolina paddled
the Little River from just below its one dam to the Withlacoochee and
on to the Suwannee a week ago, and liked it a lot.
If you want a really good four-day canoe trip, put in right near Reed Bingham State Park at the highway 37 bridge. There’s an excellent put in right there. And spend four days canoeing down this river. I don’t think you’ll regret it.
That’s from somebody who has led expeditions all over the U.S., from the Grand Canyon to the Smokey Mountains, interviewed Saturday a week ago at Troupville Boat Ramp.
Thanks to Valdosta-Lowndes County Parks and Recreation Authority (VLPRA) for fixing up the access to what it calls Little River Boat Ramp, on GA 133 west of Valdosta off I-75 Exit 18. WWALS calls it Troupville Landing, after Troupville, the Lowndes County seat before Valdosta, just downstream at the confluence with the Withlacoochee River. It’s the most downstream access to the Little River on the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail.
It’s also called the prison boat ramp, after the state prison across the road. Here’s looking upstream to the bridge. Continue reading
Valdosta already had an airplane fly over Lowndes County and collect
Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data for flood mapping.
Will Lowndes County step up and match Valdosta on this project
that affects everybody in the county (and downstream into Florida)?
Valdosta
started this LiDAR project in March 2015, and
Valdosta fronted the entire cost to get it done,
we know because Valdosta Assistant Director of Utilities Emily Davenport
and Valdosta City Council Tim Carroll told us at a meeting Valdosta held
at the request of WWALS for interested parties downstream in Florida
and from as far away as Atlanta.
On the agenda for the 8:30 AM Monday morning Lowndes County Commission Work Session, item 7.d. Continue reading
Julie Bowland reports:
Joy of joys! The humongous mud hole in the access road to the boat ramp off 133 across from the prison has finally been filled! And a sign calling it a park…could WWALS brochures be far behind?
This is the Little River Boat Ramp on the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail (WLRWT).
George Page, Executive Director of the Valdosta-Lowndes Parks & Rec Authority (VLPRA), told me it seems like a year or more ago that he had found funds to fix that access, and now I guess it’s happening.
It’s always been a park, listed under VLPRA as Continue reading
Update 2025-01-21: Little River upstream 2014-06-28.
Paddle upstream on the Little River and float back down:
the WWALS June Outing.
When: Please arrive by 8:30 AM so everyone can be ready to put in by 9AM.
Where: GA 133 bridge at the border of Brooks County and Lowndes County, Georgia. If we go far enough up, Continue reading
![[A happy paddler]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2018-03-24--burt-kornegay/20180324_141501.jpg)