Water managers are going to be being forced to dump billions of gallons of Lake Okeechobee water out the Caloosahatchee River any day. The lake was above 16 feet, and 17 is the max they want to carry. The Kissimmee River was flowing at five times what the Caloosahatchee was flowing. I don’t know exactly when, but it’s not hard to foresee a major dump soon. How will this affect Charlotte Harbor and nearshore Gulf waters?
I am not predicting gloom and doom. But I am very concerned about how a significant outflow of nutrient-laden fresh water will influence our fishing and waters. Our waters are finally cooling down. The rainy season is past but tropical depressions have continued. Will we get more rainfall? More runoff will lead to more lake water dumped, and that brings the potential for more water quality challenges — something we really don’t need to deal with.
An article I recently found in the Eco-Voice (a daily online publication I follow) stated “To save nature, we must protect 30 percent of the ocean.” (See it at https://bit.ly/3DhqiLp.) According to the article, we have lost 60 percent of our wildlife since 1970. Two-thirds of our wetlands have disappeared. A third of reef-forming corals and more than a third of our marine mammals are threatened with extinction.
Three-quarters of our planet’s lands and two-thirds of our oceans have been significantly altered. And we seem to be altering the rest as fast as we can. I believe what we really need to alter is our thinking. We have to change our direction of destruction and disrespect before it’s too late.
I’m not an expert on climate change, but I am smart enough to understand that what we have accomplished in the name of progress is changing our climate. Just look at the amount of dark pavement (both roads and parking lots) and dark rooftops we have built in my lifetime, most of it replacing green vegetation. We cannot continue to disrespect our planet and also expect to survive here.
We need question everything we read or hear, even if we agree with it, but there is a lot for us to at least consider in this article. While it seems exaggerated, the more we look at our manipulation of our planet’s life the scarier it gets. We are destroying the planet faster than it can compensate for our damage. America contributes more than our share but other countries like China make us look good in comparison.
I do not advocate we stop everything. We still need to live and work. But at some point, we must balance our destruction to ensure the very survival of our species. If we don’t slow the damage we’re doing, it will overtake our ability to live here. It’s a global problem, but it’s also a backyard problem. Look at how local growth is changing our quality of life. It broadens the tax base but depletes our natural habitats.
The damage we have already done is not good, but when you factor in our rate of increased destruction, the picture is far uglier. I do not foresee a happy ending if we continue to disrespect our environment. Solutions are not going to be easy, but the consequences of continuing our careless destruction are inevitable without change. Even baby steps improve our prognosis.
For example, I would love to see county commissioners increase impact fees on new construction to their max. What is $4,000 on homes averaging $350,000? Every new home built adds more stress on our resources — stress that has to be mitigated, and that takes money. Lots of money. It’s not fair for existing taxpayers to support new homes. Let the builders (and by extension, the new residents) pay their own way.
What it comes down to is basic: We are not respecting our home, and that is guaranteed to catch up to us eventually. Let’s work to at least slow down the collapse and do what we can to prolong our quality of life. I’m not a young man, and it’s not going to matter too much longer for me. What about you? What about your kids and grandkids? Our decisions and actions today will have enormous impact on their world tomorrow. They will rightly condemn us if we screw this up.
Capt. Van Hubbard is a highly respected outdoor writer and fishing guide. He has been a professional USCG-licensed year-round guide since 1976, and has been fishing the Southwest Florida coast since 1981. Contact him at 941-468-4017 or VanHubbard@CaptVan.com.
https://www.yoursun.com/coastal/boatingandfishing/what-are-we-doing-to-our-planet/article_18f8f6e8-33ee-11eb-87c1-674e04b6ead8.html
2020-12-02 23:00:00Z
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