So, many of the River Kidz (sadly so) are familiar with the gross discharges that have been occurring year after year. Even as smart as the Kidz are, the problem can be so complex. I wanted to take a moment to help the kidz (and parentz) understand one of the biggest solutions to our problem.
Let me break this down.
Prior to the 1960's, the Kissimmee River meandered through the center of the state of Florida a total of 103 miles. Today, the Kissimmee River runs only 50+ miles STRAIGHT down the center of the state. I HUGE difference when your talking filtrating dirty water, which is what occurred decades ago. When we see heavy rains in north Florida, most of the time, that water ends up in Lake Okeechobee. That same dirty water potentially could end up right there in our own lagoon if we were to see discharges coming from Lake Okeechobee.
It's said that once Lake Okeechobee reaches 15.5 ft., the Army Core of Engineers (ACOE) releases Lake O water out to our estuaries so that people around the lake aren't faced with flooding or a breaching of the dike, which would be catastrophic for South Florida. So what do we do if we don't want to harm families south of the lake and we don't want dirty water killing our lagoon, our livelihoods and harming the people and animals because of toxic algae blooms? There's a lot of great ideas on the table, but one solutions is obvious.
A FLOW WAY SOUTH!!!
Lets talk about the hydrology aspect of the issues here, even with clean water, we CAN NOT afford the discharges we have seen. Our estuary contains brackish water. The amount of fresh water we saw last year was devastating, possibly even more devastating then the algae blooms we saw. Salinity levels were obsolete. For those who don't know, brackish is half fresh water and half salt water....certain animals need that kind of habitat in order to survive. Too much salt or fresh water can have a very bad effect, which is what we encountered last year, especially with our oysters.
One of the most exciting plans on the table IS a flow way south. What would happen is the Herbert Hoover dike would be replaced with an opening for water to flow NATURALLY from, water would filter through the river of grass south of the lakes and into the Everglades. The problem we are facing is the pollutants in the water due to heavy agriculture. These are the same harmful chemicals that are causing toxic algae blooms and killing off many species of animals
surrounding the lagoon. In order to send the water south, we MUST have clean water which is also proposed in what is known as "Plan 6". "Plan 6" or the Flow way south plan would store water, clean the water and convey the water through the river of grass as mother nature intended NATURALLY.
Of course, this is not the only solution on the table. This is however, one of the BEST, most beneficial plans out there and has been for some time. We of course have some hurdles to make it through before we can get there but, we're pretty excited about this solution and know with the kidz help, we can get there.
Thank you for reading today's blog. We hope you found it informative and of course, should you have ANY questions, feel free to comment below, send an email to riverkidzslc@gmail.com, comment on our Facebook page or even on Twitter. We are ALWAYS willing to answer any questions some of the Kidz may have. If we cant get them, we will ask one of the hundreds of experts we're friendz with.
River Kidz news:
- We're still looking for familiez to participate in our trunk or treat on October 12. Send an email if you are interested in helps. We are hoping to have at least 20 cars.
- Sunday, October 5th from 1:00pm to 3:00pm, the Manatee Center will be doing Sunday Stories with Marianne Berkes, awarding winning children's author.
- The IRL Science Fest was a HUGE success. We would like to welcome all the new familiez that signed up with the River Kidz.
- October 8th, we'll be meeting with the Indian River County Homeschoolers group to discuss the issues along our lagoon, look at MUCK and work on an activity.
- Monthly we'll be emailing a newsletter with all the months events that occured and are coming up.
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