October 1, 2008

Next meeting of the Silver Springs Basin Working Group

The next meeting of the Silver Springs Basin Working Group will be held on May 14, 2009. Please contact the Coordinator for more details (see panel to right).

1 comment:

Criss said...

Thanks for all your hard work in protecting Silver Springs! Keep up the good work in 2009. Here is an article that recently appeared in the Star Banner...Enjoy, C.

Now is the time to protect Florida's precious springs

By Robert Knight
Special to the Star-Banner


Published: Sunday, December 14, 2008 at 6:30 a.m.
Last Modified: Sunday, December 14, 2008 at 6:15 a.m.
Florida's springs are not eternal — they are being degraded in a variety of ways due to the state's increasing human population. The magnificent artesian springs in Florida are displaying alarming changes, including reductions in water flow, elevated nutrient concentrations, reductions in natural aquatic vegetation and fish, and increasing populations of filamentous algae.

Mother Nature is providing a wake-up call to human society that it is time to clean up our act.

Several stressors are changing our springs. Reduced groundwater levels and increasing nitrate nitrogen concentrations are both indirect effects of human land-use decisions. Altered plant and wildlife communities often result from excessive human recreation and aquatic plant management activities..

While we ramp up our scientific understanding of springs' ecology, there are relatively simple but effective measures we can take to reduce the direct and indirect human impacts on springs. The following suggestions are intended to focus attention and action on the biggest offenses first.

Declining flows may be the greatest threat to spring survival. Kissengen Spring in Polk County, White Springs in Hamilton County, and Worthington Springs in Union County, all former spring-focused resorts, have stopped flowing. A non-flowing spring is a sinkhole and a clear signal that groundwater levels have significantly declined.

The most important step we can take to solve the problem of declining spring flows is to reduce water consumption in all of our springsheds to sustainable levels. While individuals can reduce their own consumption, only decisive action by our water management districts (WMDs) can produce real change in water use habits. The regulations are already in place to protect and preserve spring flows for the environment and people of the entire state — minimum flows and levels must be enacted by the WMDs to ensure an adequate quantity of water in the Floridan aquifer sufficient to protect springs from significant harm.

No new water-use permits should be issued in any springshed for a major spring in Florida until it is determined whether human consumptive uses of water need to be reduced to restore springs that have already suffered harm.

Human activities may have unintended consequences by increasing the load of nitrate nitrogen percolating from the ground surface to the underlying Floridan aquifer. Nitrate is a known pollutant when elevated in groundwater and surface water. Nitrate concentrations in the Floridan aquifer, the drinking water supply for more than 90 percent of Floridians and the source of water for all of our artesian springs, is significantly elevated throughout much of North and Central Florida. Nitrate concentrations are from 50 to 1,000 times higher than their natural background in the groundwater, present at levels that can lead to explosive algal blooms in springs and rivers, and approaching levels that are acutely toxic to human infants.

Existing Florida law prohibits groundwater contamination by substances that are harmful to surface water resources, especially those adapted to naturally low nutrient conditions. The Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) under mandate from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Clean Water Act, is the agency responsible for protecting Florida's environment from all forms of pollution that are harmful to the propagation of fish and wildlife and that create harm to human uses. FDEP needs to step up to the plate and confront the fact that the Floridan aquifer is highly contaminated by nitrate nitrogen and aggressively enforce the existing laws that require it and other state agencies to regulate human activities that pollute the environment, especially in areas of high aquifer vulnerability.

All springs contaminated with nitrate should be declared impaired, and FDEP should exert its authority to enforce needed reductions in fertilizer use and loads of nitrogen resulting from the disposal of human and animal wastewaters.

Recreation causes direct impacts in springs — humans literally can love springs to death. Trampling, uprooting, and increased turbidity all remove native aquatic plants in numerous springs and allow increased dominance of filamentous algae and nuisance exotic plants. Exotic plant control using herbicide applications also disrupts spring ecology by creating low oxygen conditions due to the dying plant biomass.

Managers at the Ichetucknee Springs State Park have implemented a successful public use and aquatic plant management strategy that allows a sustainable level of tubing without causing permanent harm to the sensitive underwater plant communities. Nuisance plants are removed by hand rather than with herbicides. This example shows that recreational activities can be limited in springs without eliminating the ability of the loving public to enjoy their natural beauty.

All springs in public ownership need to have their management goals re-evaluated to ensure that public use and aquatic plant management activities are limited to levels that protect water quality and preserve the natural ecological functions of springs.

Mother Nature's siren is sounding a clear warning at many of our springs. The question for us is whether we take action now to stop the increasing degradation of our most precious water resources or if we continue to wait to see how much worse they can become.