Tag Archives: Suwannee River

Single paddler down the Suwannee River 2022-03-17

Update 2022-03-23: Holton Creek to Dowling Park River Camp, Suwannee River –DB Marsh 2022-03-23.

Danny “DB” Marsh is paddling a thousand mile loop from Fernandina Beach and back. He is currently at Woods Ferry River Camp on the Suwannee River, where I just talked to him on the telephone.

[Paddling the Suwannee]
Paddling the Suwannee

He bypassed the Okefenokee Swamp because he didn’t realize how far in advance you have to reserve sleeping platforms. So he put in on the Suwannee at Fargo. Like many of us, he hopes that nice welcome center reopens some time soon.

He is from Montana, and is still amazed by alligators.

“To this Montana boy, seeing them up close and free is a mixture of amazement, joy and terror at the same time. They however wanted nothing to do with me, and would dive from their riverbanks into the water with huge splashes to watch me pass from their safety of the water. I counted 13 that day, I’m sure many more were unseen.”

[Fargo Welcome Center vacant]
Fargo Welcome Center vacant

He has solar panels to recharge his electronics, but it’s nice to get to a River Camp with electricity, so he appreciates the Suwannee River Wilderness Trail. Continue reading →

Hike: Bell Springs to Big Shoals, Suwannee River 2022-03-19

Due to high water, we have rescheduled the Saturday paddle to become a 2-hour easy hike from Bell Springs to Big Shoals on the Suwannee River, led by Practicing Geologist Dennis J. Price of Hamilton County, Florida. Here’s a way to see Florida’s only Class III rapids with no need for a boat.

When: Gather 8 AM, caravan 9 AM, hike 9:30 AM, end 12 PM, Saturday, March 19, 2022

Put In: Nature & Heritage Tourism Center, 10499 Spring St, White Springs, FL 32096, at the corner of Bridge and Spring Street.

GPS: 30.32947, -82.759426

Take Out: Meet at the Tourism Center, sign in, and Dennis will lead a caravan to Bell Springs, where the hike begins and ends.

Bring: hiking boots and clothes, drinking water, and first aid kit. Also trash pickers and trash bags: every WWALS outing is also a cleanup.

Free: This outing is free to WWALS members, and $10 (ten dollars) for non-members. You can pay the $10 at the outing, or online:
https://wwals.net/outings

We recommend you support the work of WWALS by becoming a WWALS member today!
https://wwals.net/donations/#join

Event: facebook, meetup

[Map: Bell-Springs to Big Shoals]
Map: Bell-Springs to Big Shoals

Continue reading →

WWALS at Wild Azalea Festival, White Springs, FL 2022-03-19

A very congenial festival next to the Suwannee River in White Springs, Florida.

When: 10 AM – 4 PM, Saturday, March 19, 2022

Put In: Nature & Heritage Tourism Center, 10499 Spring St, White Springs, FL 32096, at the corner of Bridge and Spring Street.

GPS: 30.329470, -82.759426

Take Out: Same as Put In.

Free: No charge.

We recommend you support the work of WWALS by becoming a WWALS member today!
https://wwals.net/donations/#join

Volunteer: WWALS members, we could use you at the WWALS booth.

What: according to the Town of White Springs:

The Town of White Springs and the Stephen Foster State Folk Culture Center are pleased to present the 🌺 20th Annual Wild Azalea Festival on Saturday, 10 am – 4 pm, at the Nature & Heritage Tourism Center in historic White Springs, Florida. Come out and enjoy live entertainment, craft and food vendors, raffles, duck race, cornhole tournament, kids’ area, and more! 😍

Event: facebook, meetup

[Wild Azalea Festival, WWALS Booth]
Wild Azalea Festival, WWALS Booth (2019)

Continue reading →

Bad Knights Ferry heading downstream 2022-03-10

Update 2022-03-18: OK water quality, Withlacoochee, Little, Alapaha Rivers 2022-03-17.

Not a good weekend for boating, fishing, or swimming in the Withlacoochee River. Better stick to the Alapaha River, or the Suwannee upstream from the Withlacoochee River Confluence.

WWALS found very high E. coli at Knights Ferry Boat Ramp for Thursday, and high background Fecal coliform there and downstream at Nankin and State Line Boat Ramps.

[Chart, River, Swim Guide]
Chart, River, Swim Guide

Knights Ferry is where E. coli from cattle manure usually is first detected in the Withlacoochee River after washing down Okapilco Creek out of Brooks County, Georgia. Notice almost an inch of rain on the east side of Brooks County at US 84 on the Withlacoochee River, and 1.4 inches on the west side at Dixie, GA. When there’s more than half an inch of rain on Brooks County, we usually see this problem. Continue reading →

Support Georgia HB 1289 to protect the Okefenokee Swamp 2022-02-24

Please ask Georgia legislators to pass HB 1289 against mining near the Okefenokee Swamp. Twin Pines Minerals, LLC, an Alabama-based company operated by people with a history of misrepresentation and pollution, is proposing a mining operation that threatens the Okefenokee Swamp and tourism-related jobs in the area, as well as the Floridan Aquifer and the Suwannee and St. Marys Rivers.

[Otter, Okefenokee Swamp, 2019-12-07. Photo: Gretchen Quarterman]
Otter, Okefenokee Swamp, 2019-12-07. Photo: Gretchen Quarterman

Floridians, you can do these things, too. The Swamp is upstream from Florida, both aboveground and through the Floridan Aquifer. You can call these Georgia legislators using the numbers in here: House and Senate.

For what’s in the bill and some other ways you can stop such mines, see Continue reading →

Federal water grants funneled through Georgia to Suwannee River Basin

The Georgia Governor’s office yesterday announced grants to many cities and counties for water projects. The funds come from the federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) of 2021.

Of the eighteen awardees in the Suwannee River Basin, adding up to $57,285,314.00, no surprise, Valdosta got the most. No, it’s not to fix some more of those sewer and manhole problems. It’s to build a new drinking well system, “southwest of the City limits, west of I-75 on Highway 84 near exit 16…”

Hahira, with about 5% of Valdosta’s population, got the second most, to fix its wastewater treatment plant and some stormwater drainage. Maybe that will stop Hahira from leaking E. coli into Franks Creek and the Little River.

[Treatment Plant Flow Diagram]
Treatment Plant Flow Diagram

Ray City got a substantial amount to fix its aging wastewater treatment plant, which should be good for Cat Creek and the Withlacoochee River.

Unfortunately missing is Quitman, which wanted $482,000 to top off local funds for fixing its lift stations. So no ARPA help to Quitman for stopping sewage spills into Okapilco Creek and the Withlacoochee River.

Here are those awardees, most to least: Continue reading →

Bridge to Bridge Suwannee River paddle for White Springs Wild Azalea Festival 2022-03-19

Update 2022-03-15: Due to high water, replaced by Hike: Bell Springs to Big Shoals, Suwannee River 2022-03-19.

Join us for a geologic education paddle through millions of years, on a scenic two-mile stretch of the Suwannee River. Led by Practicing Geologist Dennis J. Price of Hamilton County, Florida, we will pass White Sulphur Spring, the first Floridan Aquifer Spring encountered on the Suwannee River.

Once you land, you can go on up to the Wild Azalea Festival! The festival is conveniently located at the corner of Spring and Bridge Street, 10499 Spring St, White Springs, FL 32096.

[US 41 Bridge past FL 136 Bridge, Suwannee River, White Springs, Florida]
US 41 Bridge past FL 136 Bridge, Suwannee River, White Springs, Florida

Dennis Price explains, “For millions of years, Florida was a limestone platform not connected to the now North American continent. For eons the limestone bed would emerge, the bed surface would erode then sink again, several times. Each time the limestone would build again with a different set of fossils. The last limestone bed to deposit was the Suwannee Limestone. Florida thru this time was separated from the continent by the Suwannee Straits, similar to the Florida straits separating Florida from Cuba. Erosional sediments from the continent was slowly filling the Straits and when finally filled, sediments began covering the limestone that was Florida. These sediments are known as the Hawthorne formation today.”

When: Gather 8 AM, launch 8:30 AM, end 10 AM, Saturday, March 19, 2022

Put In: Suwannee River Wayside Park Ramp @ US 41. From White Springs, travel south on US 41 to the river; the ramp is on the south side in the town park, in Hamilton County.
This is where the Suwannee River Wilderness Trail officially starts, although the WWALS web pages and map include the entire river up into Georgia and the Okefenokee Swamp.

GPS: 30.3255, -82.739167 ,

Take Out: Stephen Foster Folk Culture Center State Park Launch, 11016 Lillian Saunders Drive/U.S. Highway 41, White Springs FL 32096.
$5.00 per vehicle (up to 8 people) State Park entry fee.

White Sulphur Springs is after the second bridge but before the takeout. It was one of the first tourist attractions in Florida. Nowadays you can visit the empty bathhouse, see the trickle of water coming out, and read what Dennis wrote: The NFRWSP’s job is to figure out how to increase water levels in the aquifer. –Dennis J. Price 2016-12-12.

Bring: the usual personal flotation device, boat, paddles, food, drinking water, warm clothes, and first aid kit. Also trash pickers and trash bags: every WWALS outing is also a cleanup. Mosquitoes can be bad at dusk so come prepared.

Free: This outing is free to WWALS members, and $10 (ten dollars) for non-members. You can pay the $10 at the outing, or online:
https://wwals.net/outings

We recommend you support the work of WWALS by becoming a WWALS member today!
https://wwals.net/donations/#join

Continue reading →

Georgia Okefenokee protection bill HB 1289 filed on Okefenokee Swamp Day 2022-02-08

On newly-proclaimed Okefenokee Swamp Day, a bipartisan bill to ban mining on Trail Ridge by the Okefenokee Swamp appeared in the Georgia legislature: HB 1289.

[Bill, Proclamation, Trail Ridge]
Bill, Proclamation, Trail Ridge

What You Can Do

You can ask Georgia Governor Kemp to get the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (GA-EPD) to deny the permit request from Twin Pines Minerals, LLC, for a titanium dioxide strip mine within three miles of the Okefenokee Swamp, which is the headwaters of the St. Marys and Suwannee Rivers. Or ask your city or county government to pass a resolution supporting the Swamp and opposing the mine, as half a dozen have already done.

Or write directly to GA-EPD: TwinPines.Comment@dnr.ga.gov

Or use this convenient Georgia Water Coalition action alert form to ask your statehouse delegation to pass HB 1289 and to ask GA-EPD to deny the permits.

Why

Continue reading →

Clean Rivers 2022-02-03

Update 2022-02-12: Clean Rivers 2022-02-10.

Clean rivers all week, according to Valdosta in the middle and WWALS upstream and down.

There is some rain falling today in Georgia, but probably not enough to wash much into the rivers.

I would paddle this weekend. Actually, I am, tomorrow, Saturday, February 5, 2022, from US 41 on the Alapaha River to Gibson Park on the Suwannee River. Expedition leader Shirley Kokidko says, “There is limited room for vehicles at the put-in so everyone needs to park up by the highway and carry kayaks down to the river. It is muddy and slippery at the launch. I would not recommend this outing for beginners due to alot of strainers and deadfall in the river with a good current also pushing you along. The water is cold and it is predicted to be a cool day so bring a change of clothes, just in case.”

[Chart, River, Swim Guide]
Chart, River, Swim Guide

No new sewage spills have been reported. GA-EPD on January 28 did update the Ashburn 40,000 gallon January 1 spill to note correctly that Hat Creek is in the Suwannee River Basin (not Ocmulgee), after I pointed out their typo. As usual, we have seen no sign of that E. coli on the Alapaha River, nor of any from Ashburn’s 30,000 gallon January 16 spill, presumably because Ashburn is so far upstream. Continue reading →

GA Suwannee-Satilla RWPC Meeting 2022-03-09

Water gaps and water quality: the Georgia Suwannee-Satilla Regional Water Planning Council meets 10-15 AM to 2 PM, Wednesday, March 9, 2022 at Coastal Pines Technical College, 1701 Carswell Ave, Waycross, GA 31503. There is an online method of attendance, unfortunately via Microsoft Teams.

Unlike Florida’s Suwannee River Water Management District, SSRWPC has no paid staff, no budget to speak of, and no taxing, permitting, or fining ability. Its Council is all volunteers, assisted by a few staff from the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (GA-EPD) and sometimes a consultant or two.

[Region, Public Notice]
Region, Public Notice

SUWANNEE-SATILLA

REGIONAL WATER PLANNING COUNCIL MEETING

Announcement Date: February 2, 2022

TO ALL INTERESTED PERSONS AND PARTIES:

The Suwannee-Satilla Regional Water Planning Council

will hold a meeting at the following date, time and location:

Wednesday, March 9, 2022

Registration: 10:15 A.M. – 10:30 A.M.

Meeting: 10:30 A.M. – 2:00 P.M.

Note: This Meeting may be attended In-Person (with Social Distancing Measures in place) or Virtually via the MS Teams Link with Call-In Information Provided Below

Coastal Pines Technical College
1701 Carswell Ave
Waycross, GA 31503

If you are planning to attend the meeting in-person please send your RSVP notice to woodsh@cdmsmith.com so we can ensure we do not exceed the venue capacity.

For Virtual Attendance use this link: Continue reading →