The dredger has been in my canal in Cocoa Beach for the last month. While it is a noisy contraption I am quite happy having 5 feet of muck removed. I have also noticed that the clarity of the water has improved immensely over the last few weeks. I now have 8-10 foot visibility under my dock. I am also quite happy to report a ton of 6-8 inch mullet are in the canal. I'm sure the dredger is not causing this but curious of the actual cause.
Cooler weather? 2 weeks of a west wind?
Tom, any idea why the better clarity? Have other areas shown this improvement?

Same here rocket, clarity way up. Initially it seemed the dredge stirred up something the brown algae liked and it seemed to flourish. Now it's almost as if a food source is gone. It's been a few years since the bird feeding frenzies that used to happen this time of year. i've been seeing more birds Kingfishers, ospreys and seagulls fishing. Hopeful but setting the bar low.

water clarity probably associated with dropping water temps.... cooler temps kill off the brown algae. We've had really clear ICW water up here this past week (not common) and made for some great sightfishing for redfish sunning themselves in the shallows

Good to hear!

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Dora Hates You

As GS said, a lot of birds are working the canals. Pelicans, cormorants, ospreys.....
I decided to join in the hunt and freelined a pretty large mullet whilst cooking dinner.
Didn't see any action on the rod but when I went to check I did have a big ole nasty catfish.
Semi-unrelated, 2 days ago I saw 3 bald eagles overhead at around 300 feet.

Drier than normal weather reduces nutrient loading from run off. Muck removal reduces internal loading. Some may remember the worst of the 2016 brown tide in BRL was January building into March riding on abnormally rainy winter. That bloom collapsed in warming weather and caused a historic fish kill. 2019 has been pretty dry on the whole. IRL is clearing up in our neck of the woods.

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Edited: 12/08/2019 at 02:11 PM by scombrid

Yes in the old days the clearing of the canals corresponded with colder water but like Scom said the worst brown algae event was during the cold season. Oxygen sucked from water (right?) and fish dead, a sad event.

This current clearing of the water happened before the real cooling this year but maybe it helped.

It would be great if there were some definitive books we could check out on brown algae/red tide and such. Anyone have recommendations on papers and the like? I realize there are those that will refute anything that points to man as a change agent but educated people tends to make a society better.

Shouldn't these leaking septic tanks still be fouling the river?

Of perhaps the reduction of fertilizer is finally taking effect?

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I was right.

^^^I just do not see how anything will change, I still see the same fert. Co. making the rounds, landscapers blowing grass into the canals (who's going to monitor them anyways and it it easier than blowing back into yard)....Also, Sewer service stops around Publix to the south of the county, so all this houses from Publix to SBI are on septic (Not sure about the N. end of the county)....Finally the cost of converting from Septic to sewer can run up to 10K-15k+ for re-plumb, main line runs/connections, meters, impact fees and removal of septic tank...My feeling is unless forced to convert 99% will not, for now I just stay out of the river, I think the muck removal will be like beach re-nourishment...expensive and ongoing forever..All septic systems leak and leach directly into the soil, some at a very high rate , and some that have a proper drain field but it all goes somewhere...just one persons opinion

Edited: 12/11/2019 at 02:08 PM by SurferMic

Agreed Cole and surfermic. Bandaids. We need a miracle of backbone at the county and citizen level. I still have neighbors shooting shit on St Augustine.

Sigh. Dredging is indeed a bandaid. 1) stop application of of all nonessential fertilizer, if you can't eat it, you get the idea. 2) set and enforce permit limits on nitrogen and phosphorus in reuse water, there are none currently. 3) tie in septic to sewer. These are in order of ease of implementation and cost. 1) no fertilizer costs nothing and can start now 2) wastewater plant upgrades a few 10s of millions, takes a decade. 3) septic to sewer, $15,000 x 90,000 units in Brevard alone. Good luck, decades, start with the worst first. None of this is rocket science, in fact it's pretty easy. Repeat sigh.

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add a signature since I'm here in profile anyway

Edited: 12/10/2019 at 05:44 PM by tom

I had a marine contractor out at my dock today for an estimate and I was talking to him about the water clarity. I mentioned that I saw the same dredger crew idling down my canal dumping snow shovels full of some white substance. He said that it could be Alum which attaches to the phosphorus and clears the water quickly. Any idea if this product was used during the Cocoa Beach dredging? Here's a link to Nat Geo that explains the substance.......Aluminum Sulfate
PS out C/R fishing behind CB high and caught a few healthy 14 to 16 inch trout. The water looks pretty nice.