mirrocraft16
Well-known member
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2023
- Messages
- 113
- Reaction score
- 93
- LOCATION
- NJ
Around here they may have stopped polluting the water these days but the damage was done way back in the 50's and 60's and its permanent. There's been talk about draining one lake and dredging and hauling away all the bottom material but they actually tried and started that project once before and the fumes coming off the exposed bottom were considered too dangerous to the surrounding areas to deal with and they refilled the lake and forgot about it for 30 or so years. Now there's talk about digging it all up again. The fish in the lake actually seem to have recovered and its the deeper sediment that holds the contamination.
I'm no expert by any means but its hard to say if its better to just leave it be and let nature handle it or to dig it all up and ruin what nature has done over the past 30 to 40 years to be rid of the issue and hope for a healed lake in another 30 years or so.
My guess is that any signs of the heavy metal contamination is now buried under 3 to 4 feet of bottom sediment and no longer affecting the wildlife or water.
The Delaware bay has suffered badly over the past 25 or so years. Fish populations have decreased drastically and even the trash fish seem to have move out over the past 5 or 6 years. Now there's a ban on even what was once considered trash fish.
The bay used to be loaded with striped bass, black drum, bluefish, perch, and weakfish. Now your lucky to catch a crab or small shark on some days.
Crabs are still fairly plentiful but most come from the back bays and creeks too. I think a few warmer winters that we had may have helped the crab population because they didn't seem to go dormant a few years.
Warnings about shell fish have been pretty common in recent years, there's always areas with a "Do Not Eat" warning.
The more local ponds area also contaminated here, a few with heavy metals from upstream factories, a few are deemed unsafe due to septic runoff, and fecal bacteria levels they blame on ducks and geese. Most ponds turn into a green algae covered mess during the summer with no signs of life here. Most water is very shallow and water temps rise quickly when the inflow is lower due to lack of rain.
Its hard to even want to fish somewhere that smells so bad it hurts to breath the air or the fish in the water carry that same odor.
A few ponds are so contaminated with algae that when you launch your boat your trailer comes out completely covered in thick green algae that dried up and smells so bad your neighbors complain for a month about the smell. The last time I took a boat out in one of those ponds it looked like those trees in a southern swamp covered in Spanish moss. The algae was hanging off it so thick you couldn't see the trailer at all. The dark water line stains on the hull of the boat were permanent without the use of bleach and some abrasive aluminum polish.
I'm no expert by any means but its hard to say if its better to just leave it be and let nature handle it or to dig it all up and ruin what nature has done over the past 30 to 40 years to be rid of the issue and hope for a healed lake in another 30 years or so.
My guess is that any signs of the heavy metal contamination is now buried under 3 to 4 feet of bottom sediment and no longer affecting the wildlife or water.
The Delaware bay has suffered badly over the past 25 or so years. Fish populations have decreased drastically and even the trash fish seem to have move out over the past 5 or 6 years. Now there's a ban on even what was once considered trash fish.
The bay used to be loaded with striped bass, black drum, bluefish, perch, and weakfish. Now your lucky to catch a crab or small shark on some days.
Crabs are still fairly plentiful but most come from the back bays and creeks too. I think a few warmer winters that we had may have helped the crab population because they didn't seem to go dormant a few years.
Warnings about shell fish have been pretty common in recent years, there's always areas with a "Do Not Eat" warning.
The more local ponds area also contaminated here, a few with heavy metals from upstream factories, a few are deemed unsafe due to septic runoff, and fecal bacteria levels they blame on ducks and geese. Most ponds turn into a green algae covered mess during the summer with no signs of life here. Most water is very shallow and water temps rise quickly when the inflow is lower due to lack of rain.
Its hard to even want to fish somewhere that smells so bad it hurts to breath the air or the fish in the water carry that same odor.
A few ponds are so contaminated with algae that when you launch your boat your trailer comes out completely covered in thick green algae that dried up and smells so bad your neighbors complain for a month about the smell. The last time I took a boat out in one of those ponds it looked like those trees in a southern swamp covered in Spanish moss. The algae was hanging off it so thick you couldn't see the trailer at all. The dark water line stains on the hull of the boat were permanent without the use of bleach and some abrasive aluminum polish.
