Veronica Oakler, the new WWALS Development Director, helped all morning Saturday at Azalea Festival in Valdosta,
![[Development Director, Mayor, Raffle Kayak]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-03-11--azalea-festival-saturday-pictures/many.jpg)
Development Director, Mayor, Raffle Kayak
Plus Valdosta Mayor Scott James Matheson and family posed with the Vibe Sea Ghost 130 kayak he donated, which WWALS is raffling off. The boat retails for $1,300 and comes with paddle and rudder. The Mayor says he used it only once.
It was a fine day, Continue reading
Update 2023-03-17: Clean Rivers 2023-03-16.
Update 2023-03-17: Tifton Evergreen Drive Sewage Spill 2023-03-11.
It rained this evening, but probably not enough to wash much contamination into the rivers, which were very clean before, according to WWALS water quality tests. So I would paddle, fish, or swim this weekend.
Actually, I’ll be at the Azalea Festival in Valdosta Saturday and Sunday.
No new sewage spills were reported in the past week. However, Tifton got around to reporting today a spill from a month ago. Continue reading
Update 2023-12-23: The Real Trash Problem is the Producers, and How to Stop It 2023-12-23.
Update 2023-03-29: Trash still dribbling from 2695 N Ashley St into Two Mile Branch 2023-02-24.
Every Waterkeeper and many local and even state governments brag about trash cleanups. Cleanups need to be done, but actually they are the least effective way to deal with trash. They do not stop trash; they just remove it once it blows off roads or parking lots or floats downstream.
So let’s look up, to see more effective solutions.
![[Solid waste management hierarchy]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-02-05--waste-pyramid/big/2023-02-19--Solid-waste-management-hierarchy.jpg)
Solid waste management hierarchy
Here WWALS has adapted an industry-standard waste management hierarchy diagram. We’ve gone farther than just cleaning up, containing, or even reusing the trash. Our diagram goes all the way up to stopping it being produced.
Let’s start at the pointy bottom of the pyramid. Continue reading
Update 2023-07-12: Pictures: Two Mile Branch Berkley Drive Cleanup 2023-03-25.
Update 2023-03-29: Valdosta Creek Trash Tour 2023-03-29.
Valdosta, Georgia, March 9, 2023 — Come help get trash out of the woods by Two Mile Branch, upstream and downstream from Berkley Drive, in this joint cleanup by WWALS and the City of Valdosta.
![[Two Mile Branch at Berkley Drive cleanup]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-03-25--two-mile-branch-cleanup/two-mile-branch-berkley-drive-cleanup.jpg)
Valdosta City Engineer Benjamin O’Dowd said, Continue reading
Update 2023-03-13: Mayor and Chairman’s Paddle in Valdosta Daily Times and WWALS video of what the Mayor and Chairman said.
Everybody had a good time at the Fourth Annual Mayor and Chairman’s Paddle. The water level was just right for the shoals to be ripples and the weather was perfect: not cold, not hot, nice and shady.
Phil Hubbard led this one of many WWALS paddle outings. Three people fell in and one paddle got lost, but everybody recovered and nobody went home mad.
![[Mayor, WWALS, Chairman; banners; boaters; outfall; Spook Bridge]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-03-04--mayor-paddle-pictures/many.jpg)
Mayor, WWALS, Chairman; banners; boaters; outfall; Spook Bridge
WWALS is proud to bring together Lowndes County Chairman Bill Slaughter and Valdosta Mayor Scott James Matheson at the site of the county’s recent acquisition of 71 acres from Helen Tapp to add to the 49 acres Parks and Rec already owns to eventually form Troupville Nature Park. Continue reading
Revisiting Two Mile Branch on February 27th, I asked Valdosta City Engineer Ben O’Dowd whether the Lee Street trash trap he was considering as a model to go at Berkley Drive was his design. He said no, that was all Stormwater Division.
Imagine if Mayor and Council allocated funds to put more of these in creeks across the city. Lots of trash would be kept out of the Withlacoochee and other Rivers. And also out of creeks within the city that attract children to play, and in which wildlife currently eat styrofoam that cannot digest.
Upstream education and enforcement is still needed for Valdosta’s ordinances that require property owners not to let trash escape and to have a so many trash cans strategically placed per number of parking spaces. Maybe soon the city will set an example as the Mayor has long promised by putting trash cans in its own parking lots, starting with across from City Hall.
![[Lee Street trash trap, side view, City Engineer and Stormwater Manager, door]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-02-27--lee-street-trash-trap/lee.jpg)
Lee Street trash trap, side view, City Engineer and Stormwater Manager, door
Stormwater Manager Angela Bray said she suggested the design, and her people took it from there and built the Lee Street trash trap. Continue reading
Update 2023-03-10: Clean Rivers 2023-03-09.
Happy boating, swimming, and fishing this weekend!
That’s what all the recent water quality testing data says. There’s been no rain lately, other than a few scattered showers today, so nothing should have washed into the rivers.
Come on down to Troupville Boat Ramp tomorrow for the Mayor and Chairman’s Paddle!
No new sewage spills have been reported in the Suwannee River Basin in Georgia or Florida since the last of Valdosta’s five February spills totalling almost a million gallons.
![[Chart, River, Swim Guide Map 2023-03-02]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-03-02--wq/many.jpg)
Chart, River, Swim Guide Map 2023-03-02
Thanks to Continue reading
Update 2023-03-03: Clean Rivers 2023-03-02.
For those who want to take out early from the Mayor and Chairman’s Paddle tomorrow, thanks to Paul Deloach we have access to his private boat ramp, after 2.6 river miles. That’s little more than an hour paddling.
![[Parking, Paul Deloach Boat Ramp]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-03-03--deloach-private-boat-ramp/many.jpg)
Parking, Paul Deloach Boat Ramp
As you can see, there’s plenty of parking.
So come on down to Troupville Boat Ramp as early as 8 AM, deposit your boat, or get one from State Line River Outfitters, drive to this takeout or to Spook Bridge, and the Boys & Girls Club will shuttle you back to Troupeville Boat Ramp to paddle. Don’t worry about how to drive to the takeouts: we’ll explain that tomorrow morning, and there will be convoys.
For everything else about the paddle, see:
https://wwals.net/?p=60845
There are some more pictures below.
-jsq, John S. Quarterman, Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®
You can help with clean, swimmable, fishable, drinkable, water in the 10,000-square-mile Suwannee River Basin in Florida and Georgia by becoming a WWALS member today!
https://wwals.net/donations/
Update 2023-03-03: Early takeout for Mayor and Chairman’s Paddle: DeLoach Private Boat Ramp 2023-03-03.
Update 2023-03-02: Videos: Mayor and Chairman’s Paddle, Sewage spills, Trash, Okefenokee Swamp over stripmine @ Radio 2023-02-28.
If you don’t have a boat, come on down anyway to Troupville Boat Ramp this Saturday,
for the Mayor and Chairman’s Paddle!
https://wwals.net/?p=60845
Will Hart of State Line River Outfitters has agreed to supply boats. Will will be out of town, but Bird Chamberlain will bring a couple of canoes and half a dozen kayaks, in addition to the WWALS canoes.
We even have a volunteer or two to paddle people in a canoe who are too young or whatever to paddle themselves.
![[State Line River Outfitters, Will Hart, Bird Chamberlain, Russell Allen McBride, Blondie Quarterman]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-03-04--state-line-river-outfitters-mayors-paddle/many.jpg)
State Line River Outfitters, Will Hart, Bird Chamberlain, Russell Allen McBride, Blondie Quarterman
State Line River Outfitters sponsored Bird when he paddled in the WWALS Boomerang Paddle Race last year: and won! Continue reading
Update 2023-03-03: Clean Rivers 2023-03-02.
2023-02-28: Yet another Valdosta sewage spill into Knights Creek 2023-02-22.
Happy boating, swimming, and fishing this weekend!
All the WWALS water quality test results for this Thursday were good.
We could use more water quality testers.
If you want to get trained, please use this form:
https://forms.gle/DzWvJuXqTQi12N6v7
![[Chart, River, Swim Guide 2023-02-23]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-02-23--wq/many.jpg)
Chart, River, Swim Guide 2023-02-23
Even though Valdosta had yet another major sewage spill Monday, due to inadequate sewer main bypass, it probably did not have much effect on the Alapaha River. When WWALS Testing Committee Chair Suzy Hall tested at Sasser Landing after Valdosta’s previous, even bigger, spill of Wednesday a week ago, due to sewer main collapse, results were fine at Sasser Landing, downstream of the spill location at Knights Creek, Mud Swamp Creek, the Alapahoochee River in Echols County, Georgia, and the Alapaha River in Hamilton County, Florida. Continue reading
![[Chart, Rivers, Swim Guide Map]](https://www.wwals.net/pictures/2023-03-09--wq/many.jpg)