vicrider 0 Report post Posted November 24, 2024 Growing up I always heard about Florida's Lake Okeechobee as a huge fish factory with average size bass bigger than most state records. Among the largest freshwater lakes in the country totally US and a dream trip I never did make. Now I have been watching some documentaries on the Big O and also the pollution it is causing to the Lucie and Chattahoochee Caloosahatchee Rivers and the resultant Green Algae blooms caused by the release of waters from the Big O. Learning more about this lake and the farm runoffs and industrial and residential chemicals poured into the lake the pollutants get trapped in the lake and dumped into the rivers because the lake no longer has the southward flows to flush in the Everglades. The Everglades is another place I've read and dreamed about since a kid and now try to figure how man has managed to screw up so much of the Glades by building canals just to build more homes and industry. Florida, which I understand much of the land is little more than drained swamp, still allows septic systems to be built on lands that have no filtration properties for proper treatment of residential sewage. The algae is cyanobacteria which is deadly to most forms of life, including humans. Reading about the outbreak of 2016 when Okeechobee dumped millions of gallons of water into the overflows the outbreak of algae basically stunk up and polluted miles of what was supposed to be tourist areas and shut down many of the beaches and killed many animals. Much of the beaches and waters have E. coli bacteria contamination which is largely caused by residential pollution and not the sugar farms which produce mainly the nitrogen and phosphorous pollution. Think again about Florida land and it's many poorly functioning septic systems. On a little brighter note there is a strong movement toward turning back the clock on many of the things causing the pollution and millions of dollars (billions) being spent to move waters from the Big O south to storage areas to filter the waters before moving them south to again benefit the Everglades. So I labeled this thread "questions" but instead rambled on about what I'm seeing and reading about a dream area from my youth badly in need of restoration efforts. For those of you who live, work and fish Florida in the south and the Glades and Keys are things as bad as I read and see or is it exaggerated like so many things are. The country gets bigger, the need to feed us all and provide housing and jobs continually grows, but at what cost to our environment and health? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Swamp Fly 0 Report post Posted November 24, 2024 Oh boy: Can of worms opened! 😈 I'll need to be careful not to get into environmental Politics/Corporate Influence (same thing). This is a family show after all. I'd say all of the above are correct, yet life goes on and the fish continue to eat. On the freshwater side, yes algal blooms are a real thing especially in the rivers and canals. Blue green algae does produce neurotoxins, it's to be determined how much exposure is detrimental and what long term effects of repeated smaller "dosses" will be. When it gets bad the water can look like it should glow in the dark. The state puts up don't swim in the water signs at access points. While Agricultural runoff is claimed to be the main culprit, I don't necessarily disagree, the warmer temperatures probably don't help. There is a lot of noise about "fixing" the problem by building more Stormwater Treatment Area(s) (STAs) in an effort to filter water and also provide a buffer for massive freshwater releases. So what happens when those areas "fill" up with nutrients? If we get 3-4 major tropical systems in short order I have no doubt it would flush them out into the places that we want to keep clean. Add to the fact that the only place to build those STAs is habitat that still exists. The root of the problem is that the nutrients are getting into the system to begin with. Agriculture is likely to provide the bulk of nutrients but residential systems are also a problem. While lawns continue to be fertilized the problem will persist even in areas that essentially don't have agri runoff. I can use Cape Coral as an example or "Cape Horrible" as I call it just to poke my parents who live there. There have been algal blooms there in the freshwater canals for the last few years. IMO the liquid spray services are the worst problem since the nutrients are not retained at all. Many municipalities have now banned fertilization withing x number of feet away from water during the summer months. I think that is a step in the right direction but the rest of the years is still open season and it should be period not just a given distance from the water. Having said that I also think the problem will persist until there is a cultural/social change away from a need to to have a perfect lawn (or any lawn at all). As far as as the water releases are concerned there seems to have been enough pressure applied to the US Army Corp of Engineers (read PR nightmare) to try and mitigate some of the massive releases. That said, The Corps are in a no win situation. Lake O is no longer a "natural" lake, for those that are unaware The Herbert Hoover Dike which surrounds the lake began construction in the '30s. It now holds much more water. The premise was to protect people from flooding. Water is retained during the drier part of the year, and it sure provides a lot of irrigation water.... Really I'm trying to not drift into the politics/influence of it all. If we have a "wet" dry season then a tropical system later in the year can put the dike at risk. So the Corp has to guess how much water to release in order to not risk 10's of thousands of lives with a potential breach in the dike. Out the Caloosahatchee and St Lucie rivers it goes. Both of those rivers have been channelized so there are no flood plains, the water gets flushes straight into the estuaries. Once the salt content in those estuaries drops below a certain point anything that can't swim away starts dieing, it take years if not decades to recover. Most of the bivalves don't make it and large swaths of sea grass die off. Not only does this release a massive amount of nutrients all at once from the decay but the basis of the natural filtering system that removes those nutrients to begin with is now compromised. The Corp has now adopted a preventative release schedule that will hopefully reduce the number of massive releases and keep water flow closer to historical pre-development levels. To add to the problem Lake O, the St Lucie river, and The Caloosahatchee, are part of the Inter-coastal Waterway. Water levels must be kept high enough to facilitate travel for boats up to a certain size. The glades are a mess too. While there are efforts to restore water flow, unfortunately most of those efforts don't truly restore the Glades themselves. The thousands of square miles of habitat lost aren't being restored. In fact more STA's are being built in areas that are now habitat. Most of the hoopla is about sending water south of Lake O rather than to the east and west via the Caloosahatchee and St Lucie Rivers. One of the issues with sending water south is that a lot of nutrients will go with it. Those nutrients foster the growth of cattails rather than sawgrass. Cattails are "land building" whereas saw grass is not, so more water flow will be restricted. Yet if water is not sent south (which does happen some years) then salinity levels at the top of Florida Bay get so high that they become toxic. Capt Bob can probably speak to that much better than I can. To make matters worse there seems to be very little communication between the controlling entities and even less cooperation between them. A good example is that there have been times that Everglades National Park has not allowed water in the park that the Corps needed to send south because some species was nesting and the nests would be flooded. Never mind the fact that those nests were built so low because the water levels had been controlled for years. Chicken or egg time. I'm not saying that endangered species should not be managed but management should not encourage risky behavior such as building nests lower in the bushes. Kind of like when a power plant goes down in January and then the manatees that over winter there rather than further south start to die. Maybe the manatees should be excluded and encouraged toe follow history migration behavior that doesn't rely on mechanical equipment which can fail. Red tide is another problem down here and it's a bad one. When it hits literally tons of fish wash up on shore. Tourist beaches are cleaned up with front end loaders and dump trucks. Septic systems are often blamed, and I agree that they are part of the problem, yet we always have a major bloom of the algae responsible after hurricanes that flush a ton of water and nutrients out of lake O. I'm not saying septic system aren't an issue, it's like throwing around gasoline when the world is already on fire. How to get rid of the septic systems is a big question. Cape Coral has been doing so but at what cost? When sewer and water are brought in the home owners are forced to hook up at tremendous costs ($10's of thousands). People have lost their homes over it. Other folks like me live in a areas where I doubt sewer and water will ever be brought in and if it were it would cost millions to run to maybe 100 homes. I could see our cost being 6 figures. I don't mean to sound like like a doomsayer, but we keep buying cough drops instead of treating the pneumonia. I'm not going to discus this much more because that definitely runs into politics (not necessarily one side of the isle vs the other though). The fact of the matter is that Florida has been for sale in one form or another since it's inception. Much of what "Florida" is supposed to be has been lost a long time ago. You can't pave over half the state and still call it a pristine wilderness. Even today the Florida is sold as if it were a "young pure virgin" but it is really just the way it has been treated, a vintage lady of the night. I'll leave it at that. Now just because Florida or any place else in the world is not what it was or even what it could be doesn't mean it's not worth it anymore. It is still a wonderful place to be, especially out on the water or in the woods. It's just getting tougher to find places where you won't get run over by the unwashed masses. The low hanging fruit is gone now and you have to put some effort into getting there. I'll keep doing just that until I can't walk or paddle farther than most other people are willing to, then we shall se what I do. It's not all bad. Progress has been made to restore certain areas and it's worth it to stay for those lucky enough to live here and also for guests to experience what we have to offer. It's still paradise, there is just noticeably less of it is all. In fact there is some lemonade to be had amongst the lemons if you look for it. The fishery for exotics is rather spectacular in my opinion. If you are curious, come on down. While the fishing may not be what it was (but where is it?) but it's still amazing. Lots of places to go and plenty of Guides to get you on fish if you want some pointers. I live here by choice not necessity after all, it's more than worth it to me. I'll get off of my orange crate now... Swamp P.S. A typo or auto-correct I'm sure but It's the Caloosahatchee not the Chattahoochee (that's way up north in G'awgia)🙂 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Swamp Fly 0 Report post Posted November 24, 2024 I wanted to add that I'm not dumping on lake Okeechobee, it's just a distribution point for all the crap that is allowed to flow into it. I love fishing the lake and it's creeks/canals. Swamp Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Capt Bob LeMay 0 Report post Posted November 24, 2024 Down here in paradise.. we do have more than our share of water problems - mostly human caused - but we are pulling up our socks and making some headway toward a better situation (being fought tooth and nail by those profiting from the status quo... of course). The book to read about man's dealings with the Everglades - over the last 500 years (the Spanish were here first...) is The Swamp by Michael Grunwald. While it's a history book - it reads so well you'll have trouble putting it down... Very highly recommend it for anyone wanting to learn about our water troubles and how they came about. Essentially all the natural freshwaters in our state come from rainfall, soak through a relatively thin topsoil - and are then captured in soft spongy limestone rock layers below ground. The natural waters are almost nutrient free - pure limestone hydro... Florida was never meant to have the population it has now - and the flow of people hasn't slowed one bit... All of our plant life and most of our freshwater critters (both in the water - and on land) evolved to adapt to those conditions... but that's not what we have now... Lake Okeechobee more than 100 years ago was a very large, relatively shallow lake - that overflowed it's banks every wet season (and back then, could double or even triple in size after storms and the wet season (rainy season). Along came folks just after WW I, learning that the areas south of the big lake were prime farming country (at least that's how it was advertised back then...) and during the dry season (half a year) it was dry - but.. come the second half of the year - that land might be under a few feet of water... That was the driving force behind the first attempt to control the big lake and a small dike was built around the southern perimeter of the lake to curtail the flooding... about eight feet high - and it caused a terrible disaster a few years later... A big hurricane in 1928 caused the dike to fail and released a killing flood in the dead of night. The estimates of the dead were somewhere between 600 and a 1000, mostly migrant farm workers out of the Caribbean that were never even identified,buried in mass graves or burned in great piles... This lead to the second dike (the Herbert Hoover dike), more than 20 feet high, built during the great Depression era.. I'll stop here - read the book... These days the water level in the big lake is somewhere between 10 and 14 feet if I remember correctly - and it's waters are heavily loaded with nutrients - the opposite of what it was at the turn of last century... The Coast Guard is rightly concerned about water levels since the water is nearly twice as high as it was in 1928.. so they periodically release waters to the east (the St. Lucie) and the west (the Caloosahatchee) - causing terrible water quality problems on both our east and west coast areas... I'll stop here, wihout explaining how flood control (another of those man made problems) has badly hurt the Everglades.. and a host of related troubles. But all of us that fish or enjoy the 'glades and similar areas are working hard to bring about some changes - and the fishing is still very very good - mostly... It certainly could be better, though and I'm hoping we can make the changes needed so that my grandkids can enjoy it - long after I'm gone... Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
vicrider 0 Report post Posted November 24, 2024 Thanks for a great read guys. I'm going to try to find the book used somewhere Bob and give it a good read this winter. I have a question for Bob. If I were to pick a week sometime after the first of the year what time frame would work for your type of fishing and also the exotics along the canals? I doubt I'll be up to it but if the heart holds out and the lungs keep pumping 02 in and CO2 out in sufficient quantities (I can help it with 02) I'd want to make it the final bucket trip and YES, bend the rods a lot. Flyfishing for sure, baitcasting, spinning heavy and light, I'm equipped to do it all and like I told you before I have three primary targets I'd want to search for. First, baby Tarpon from about 5-20#s. Second and third in no particular order would be redfish and snook in mangroves. I'd love to do some flipping and pitching jig and pigs in heavy cover for bass or exotics, something not available here in OK where I'm at and I sure miss from my years in WI and MN. Again, thanks guys and yes, as you both mentioned it is hard to avoid politics and as a mod I too have to be careful or another Floridian (Mike Chell) will come down on me. So far we've kept the talk on the situation today and possible improvements. We'll let the various groups involved do their infighting and outfighting and hope answers come from it. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
vicrider 0 Report post Posted November 24, 2024 Okay Bob, I just ordered the paperback of The Swamp and though it seems silly I also ordered "Summary" an analysis of the Grunwald book. Gives me the first and then a book to better understand what I just read. Nick Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
caloosa bug 0 Report post Posted November 25, 2024 lol. I said oh boy, out loud when I read the question yesterday. Lake O can become a heated discussion with many south Floridians because it has an impact on all of us. I’m almost 41 now, and have lived and fished on lake O and the caloosahatchee my entire life. I’ll probably comment more when I have time to type…but I agree with previous statements. Adding to the list of issues is the amount of spraying herbicides FWC has been doing. I’ve seen them countless times spaying areas that have no bearing on navigation or invasive species. Huge area’s of grass have disappeared the last few years from spraying alone. It just makes me mad when I hear on the afternoon local news that when water releases may happen, they use the words like “toxic”, and harmful in the same sentence with Lake O. Lake O is still a great fishery…it just fishes smaller and smaller every year. 730 square miles, and only a handful of areas consistently produce big bass. And this time of year through February, they are getting hammered by multiple big bass tournaments every weekend. A few more points and observations to come. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Capt Bob LeMay 0 Report post Posted November 27, 2024 Busy now prepping for a booking tonight (docklight fishing for snook, mostly), so I'll reply tomorrow or the next day... Here's a pic from Flamingo (in Everglades National Park) from Monday's trip... this nice gag grouper was taken in one of the many rivers that drain out of the Everglades... sure sign that winter is upon us - these grouper only show up in colder waters each year.. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jcozzz 0 Report post Posted December 2, 2024 VC- as your from Oklahoma,i would want to fish Lake Fork more than the big O.Which i have fished times and we did get a few 8-10 lb bass.My last trip we stayed in Stewart.Enjoyed the saltwater fishing more than the fresh water. I an catch bass and crappie close to home.The shellcrackers tho were quite something;.Fishing up the canals om the N side was really cool with gators and cool birds and a lot of cattle. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
vicrider 0 Report post Posted December 2, 2024 jcozzz, if you don't mind my asking where are you located? I looked up Stuart FL and it definitely gives you access to a lot of water from there. I'm glad you think it's cool to fish along canals with gators but not something I'd put high on my list. Catching big shellcrackers on fly rods is a never ending fun game. If I were to be able to get down there one of the things I would do for sure is higher on with Cap't Bob for as many days as I could afford and do canal fishing like you're talking about. I have read that a gator can outrun a man on land if it were to give chase but while I stumble along with my walker maybe they'd have a good laugh and not eat me. As for Lake Fork, yes it is one I'd be happy to spend some time on but it, like so many of the big bass lakes, is being worked so hard by tournaments where the huge catches are being done with cheater boxes, or as they call it forward facing sonar. Pick your fish and worry him to death until he bites out of frustration. I know I can be a crabby old man who fished when a depth finder was dragging a line with a heavy weight but I agree with Randy Blaukat the Live Scope should be outlawed in all tournaments and maybe in general period. We are reaching a point in technology where it becomes a heavy toll of the fisheries on our lakes and rivers. A crazy comparison but as a scratch bowler in 1970s a 300 game at an alley was talked about for weeks. Now with hardwood replaced by synthetic lanes, resin balls with multiple weight systems, and precise oiling machines 300 are expected in every tournament and almost all good bowlers have a few today. I compare technology in bowling to that in fishing only to show how science has taken over so many aspects of "sport". Okay, off my soap box. I have gift boxes of flies to wrap. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Swamp Fly 0 Report post Posted December 3, 2024 Gators: Honestly there is no reason to fear gators. Respect them? Yes, yes please, always. Even a 4' gator is a powerful animal. I'd be willing to bet that there are 10s of thousands of gator interactions a DAY in the south (not just FL), yet only a hand full of incidents happen a year. Almost all of them are clumped together around mating/nesting season. The vast majority of gator "attacks" involve people walking their small dog along the waters edge, or as I call it "trolling for gators". I figure I have an exponentially greater chance of being harmed in my truck while driving to the water than I do standing on the bank. That said if I see a gator that is "acting odd" I get away from it, discretion is the better part of valor after all. That happened to me a few weeks ago as a matter of fact. I was wading in a creek and there was a 4-5 foot gator a couple of hundred feet up stream. It was slowly swimming down stream in my direction. That was not normal, gators generally don't come towards you (unless people have been feeding them). I got out of the water. I'd be willing to bet it's gator hole was in my direction or past me. While that was a small gator I still did not want to get into it with that animal. A tea cup chihuahua can't really kill me but I still don't want to go get stitched up. On the other hand, last Friday it was "cool" and the gators were moving in slow motion. I poked a 2 footer with my toe to get it out of the way so I didn't accidentally step on it later. This was in a foot of water. Granted even with the lower temperatures if it had been any bigger I'd not have used my foot to shoo it along. I just about ran over a half a dozen with the canoe, that just doesn't happen when it's warmer. A gator is not any different than any other predator, be it four legged or two legged. Pay attention and don't walk down proverbial dark alleys where you can get mugged and then you will be fine. If there is a natural funnel to the waters edge where every racoon and possum go to drink, don't stand at the edge of the water right there. An animal as powerful as a gator can hurt or even kill a person so care should be taken. I'm still more concerned about being hurt or killed by a someones pet dog and I'm a dog person. I hope you make it down here, it's a great place. Grab some fried gator bites while you are here it might be preemptive and they are tasty! 😁 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
vicrider 0 Report post Posted December 4, 2024 Well Swamp Fly, I'm sure you're familiar with gators and comfortable around them but I'm watching a TV show on some guys fishing around the Keys and the Glades just wandering around from shore. This guy is fishing from a bridge and has what I think was a gar a couple of feet long. As he gets it close to the bridge a monster head pops up and down goes his fish down the throat of one of those "friendly" gators. For me that would make me move to the next bridge since he was fairly close to the water on that one and that would get me on the move. So, if it is possible for me to make that bucket list trip I'm going to personally contact all you guys responding for contact info and try to hook up for you to be my "gator eyes" for me on the trips I'd like to make. One of the things I did see on their trip through the keys/glades trip was the amount of trash, liquor bottles, drugs, needles and garbage in one of the popular fishing spots. Guess there is no where you can go without humanity doing their part to ruin it for everyone. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Swamp Fly 0 Report post Posted December 5, 2024 Yup, not normal behavior for a gator. As much as I like fishing Tamiami Trail (US 41) a few of the gators there can be a problem, they have a "forward personality". People catch fish and then throw them to the gators. I've moved on to the next bridge many times down there, your instincts are correct. The more time I spend way back in the woods the more I wish people would stop acting like animals. Of course that's an insult to animals... The trash can be an issue especially in some of the more urban or urban adjacent areas. Luckily in most places it's limited to some beer/soda cans and chip bags etc. As much as I'd like to blame it on whomever, a lot of the trash I see is fishing related. It's the same around most of the rest of the country that I've been to. Swamp Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
caloosa bug 0 Report post Posted December 6, 2024 Spending a day on Lake O was so much better than being at work today. 😁. It was unusually calm and the temperature was perfect. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
caloosa bug 0 Report post Posted December 6, 2024 On 11/24/2024 at 10:06 AM, vicrider said: Now I have been watching some documentaries on the Big O and also the pollution it is causing to the Lucie and Chattahoochee Caloosahatchee Rivers and the resultant Green Algae blooms caused by the release of waters. Vic, after reading your post again, it sounds like you have a good grasp on the facts. I quoted your first sentence as an example. Someone less educated would read that as..the Big o is causing pollution to the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee rivers. Causing algae blooms by the release of water. This would be the same way the local news stations…Ft. Myers and West Palm..would report the story every time the Army corps of Engineers mention possible water releases. we don’t have any news stations here in the sticks in the middle of the state.. they mention toxic lake o releases, and show a video clip of green algae in Cape Coral, then a clip of dead fish on the beach from red tide. Can algae be toxic? Yes. Is the water toxic and polluted? No! Do they get nasty algae in Cape Coral when no releases happen? You bet! Are the dead fish on beaches a result of lake o releases? No way, totally separate. There is a lot of misinformation out there that gets construed behind political agendas and the media. They fail to mention all the massive algae blooms that happened the last couple years when there was no water being released for months. Yes, the lake has algae blooms, and yes it gets distributed into the rivers. But I’ll be willing to bet that the water coming directly out of the lake, is cleaner than coastal river water. My useless, uneducated observation of Lake O and the Caloosahatchee is this. Since the dike was built and the rivers were dug into canals, there will always have to be water releases somewhere sometime. We need more grass to come back and the use of herbicides to stop. I counted 4 airboats spraying a couple areas today. This contributes to the amount of dead plant matter that piles up on the bottom. Not to mention the loss of filtration. When releases are planned, I would like them to be more gradual. Opening the flood gates and having class 5 rapids gushing out of the lake can stir all that matter on certain areas of the lake, and flush it right towards the coast. Then they close the gates after a week. I’d rather have them open at half speed and stay open longer. The lake and river wouldn’t get as stirred up and those helicopter views of tea colored water in the harbor, may not be as bad. The releases have actually been pretty reasonable lately and the lake and river have remained relatively clear other than what the wind does. the lake and river are both beautiful and clean. I encourage anyone thinking about fishing lake o to do so if they can. The elusive 10lbers are out there, but are getting fewer and farther between. I have a buddy who guided a shiner trip last week and they got a 10 and an 11 pound bass. Then again he had years of guiding experience and had never landed a 10+for a client until now. ps. Did you notice the log in the middle of the 7 pic I posted? Hint, it’s not a log. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites