Sailing and the environment

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tom

I didn't say that they were good to eat!!

Ed ; You may have noticed that bass fishermen often practice catch and release. There are often several aspects of everything. Especially sewage. I have no doubt that on board treatment can reduce bacteria and viruses in the effluent but they do nothing to reduce some nutrients. Some of the chemicals such as chlorine are probably worse for the environment than the raw stuff. I don't know where the oak leaf quote came from but it's probably not true. In a real sewage teatment plant crap is first settled out. This cleans up the water quite a bit. Then there is a process called activated sludge. In this process bacteria take up most of the nutrients from the water and then they settle out taking the nutrients with them. Oxygen is added to reduce biochemical oxygen demand. Really good plants make the water purer in some ways than most rivers. Now most pollution from the land comes from parking lots and streets. All of the dog poop and oil from leaky cars etc. Not to mention pesticides and fertilizer from lawns.
 
newly anonymous

newly anonymous

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Sep 24, 1999
1,511
Hunter H46LE Sausalito
coral reefs

According to the United Nations Convention on Biodiversity, coral reefs in 93 of the 109 countries that have them are currently in decline. So much for "tidal clensing."
 
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R.W.Landau

John

I would not take any United Nations anything, for granite. Please remember that the reefs here in the US, near Florida have more visitors,damage from tourists, anchors, boats running aground, etc. than any of this other stuff. Tidal cleansing is for real. Miami has dumped their sewage treatment into Biscayne Bay and in 72 hour the bay was at normal levels. So much for assumptions. This was for real. r.w.landau
 
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Peggie Hall/HeadMistress

More important than numbers is WHY...

Just saying they're in decline (assuming that it's true) means nothing. Which ones are in decline? What is damaging them? Which ones aren't? What factors don't exist in those waters that exist where damage is occurring? It's those kinds of bald statements that produce exactly the kind of knee-jerk reaction you had, John--you jumped to the conclusion, "so much for tidal cleansing" without even questioning the validity of the claim, much less asking for the reasons why. And it's those unquestioning knee-jerk reactions that environmental extremists count on to further their own agendae. Question EVERYTHING...learn the facts. Of course there are environmental abuses...and they should be stopped, or better yet, prevented. But there are far more PERCEIVED abuses than real ones...far more claims that the sky is falling--and that man is causing it--than evidence to support those claims. I gotta go pack a suitcase and finish getting ready to catch a 7 am flight in the morning. I'll be back Sunday night...meanwhile, y'all behave yourselves, ok? :)
 
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tom

tidal clean???

I have no doubt that dilution will make the effects of polution less obvious. But the last time I was in the keys I was impressed by the filth mear my hotel at Marathon. It looked and smelled like pure sewage. The boats that I have chartered in the keys had a straight pump into the sea. Chesapeak bay is so polluted that their crab population has crashed. Off of New Orleans there is a dead zone. Excess nutrients from the Mississippi river cause a huge area to have too little oxygen to support fish. I can go on and on. 6+ billion people on the planet must have an effect!!! We have a right to be here and every one of us has some effect on the environment. But are we animals that poop in the water that we use??? I don't have any answers but there are problems. Reactionaries saying that poop don't hurt water quality are as much of the problem as extremists saying that we can't do anything for fear of harming the ocean. In the end people will decide what kind of world they wish to live in. As for tidal cleansing I remember when people claimed that water was pure in a stream after it flowed over so many rocks and the local lake was so bad that it stank and you couldn't swim in it because of infections. They have since upgraded the sewage plants and the water doesn't stink and people swim and ski etc. It isn't pristine but it isn't a cesspool.
 
newly anonymous

newly anonymous

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Sep 24, 1999
1,511
Hunter H46LE Sausalito
Rush Limbaugh tricks

It seems our dear HeadMistress has adopted a page from the Rush Limbaugh book of political rhetoric: never use the word "environmental" without coupling it with "extremist." Well, let me tell you why I'm one of those nasty people, Peggy. Before I became an extremist I was a scuba instructor. I've logged over 3,000 dives going back as far as 1972, many of them on coral reefs. During the span of that career I've witnessed considerable damage due to algae blooms and sedimentation, damage that no amount of mythical "tidal clensing" is ameliorating. What you're terming a "knee jerk" reaction is actually a considered response. I've spent every working day since last August putting together a book of environmental philosophy that was submitted to my publisher just a few weeks ago. In terms of checking the facts, as you advise, the research for this book has involved spending every Monday for the past eight months in the library at Stanford University, where I'm currently a grad student. One of the facts I've discovered is that the UNEP (United Nations Environmental Program) World Conservation Monitoring Centre is a leading resource on tracking coral reef degredation worldwide. I realize that the Rush Limbaugh types of this world don't like anything that has to do with the UN, but the fact remains that coral reefs worldwide are in serious decline, and it's going to take a lot more than tidal clensing to reverse that trend.
 
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Todd

Undeniable Truth

Tom and John, I echo your concerns and observations. I started diving in the Florida Keys in 1976 and used to make the trip at least twice a year. The condition of our only reef has become an atrocity compared to what it was in past years. The reef from Sombreo on down used to be bountiful with all forms of sea life, and now it all has to be called a sanctuary to even keep any of it. However, calling it a national park can't protect it from the greying and dying effect of polution which finds its way to the Keys all the way from the Orlando area on down. Human waste - plain and simple. It is so disheartening that I quit going down there. Boater dumping is a small percentage of this waste, but it is somehow symbolic of the whole problem. Overpopulation is the ultimate culprit, but most people and the governments of the world are afraid to even aknowledge it.
 
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73mensailed

Don't we all try to keep our home (Earth) clean?

I don't know of anyone, over the last 20 years or so, that diliberatly tries to injure our enviroment. I believe we all try to do our part to keep this planet livable. Sure accidents happen and some countries in this world either do not care or lack the resources to upgrade their sanitation and/or industrial systems. It's a "let's all work together thing". BTW, John Farnsworth......Enviromental extremist is a term that profoundly defines quite a few. If you want to claim that title, fine, but it is not a badge of honor. In fact, some extremists should be put in the book of Stupid People Tricks. Like, laying down in front of a train, living in a tree for years, Spray painting SUV's because they use too much gas, but they used ozone depleting spray paint. And those actions are just from around the Bay area. I love the Bay area. My folks lived in Palo Alto while my Mother was on staff at Stanford Med. Ctr. I would read the SF newspaper on a regular basis and found that most actions, in your city, whether it be enviromentalists, atheists, passivists, etc., have been on the extreme side. Enviromentalists don't want to be called extremists, well some conservatives don't want to be called Limbaugh types either. Also the UN is nothing more than a building in New York that's full of hot air. They come out day after day with another problem in the world, but fail in finding solutions. Instead of funding more studies on how fast the coral reefs are deteriorating, how about funding a solution?
 
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Ed

I do my part, but...

I've witnessed some (hopefully a minority) who apparently don't care the least little bit about the environment. Have you ever seen people throw trash (cigarette butts, tissues, beer or soda bottles, plastic or paper cups, food wrappers) out their car windows? If so, then you've seen them too. Have you ever gone to a campsite that looked like a tordado landed there? If so, then you've seen the effects of uncaring people. On the Bay, I've never seen anyone purposely put trash or dump anything in it, but I occasionally see floating man-made debris, and woder where it came from. I'm no enviro-extremist, but I do believe in the old campers rule-of-thumb which says "leave the site cleaner than when you found it". Also, we do our best to "leave nothing but foot-prints" or in the case of sailing, "nothing but a small trailing wake". ~ Happy sails to you _/) ~
 
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Kevin

John, get your head out of the coral

John Farnsworth Let me first say that everyone is very impressed that you logged 3,000 dives and are writing a environmental philosophy book (I’m sure that will help people sleep ). I hope my tax money isn’t funding your propaganda. Why does Rush Limbaugh threaten every Liberal Extremist? Could it be that fact never back up your argument? I assume you don’t think the UNEP has an agenda. If we (people who love the sea and would do nothing intentional to harm it) sit idle people like John will introduce more tax and regulations on boaters.
 
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David

Another great

response Kevin. It is nice to know I am not the only one who is sick and tired of the "effete pseudo-intellectual snobs" who pose as environmentalists.
 
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terry timid

Oh come on ladies and gentlemen

Let us not take things personally - we are all brothers and sisters with a common interest. Clean water is more fun. Can't we all just get along?
 
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tom

debating techniques

If you can't attack the argument then attack the person. If you can't attack the argument then change the subject. Too many issues get treated this way. Instead of exchanging facts and figuring out solutions people start attacking each other. Then all of the emotions get in the way. A good honest debate attacks arguments not debaters. As I boater I am fearful of additional legislation against boaters. It does seem that the government is always more willing to pass laws than to spend money on upgrading sewage treatment plants,controlling runoff from cities etc. The biggest problem in the keys seems to be the fact that there are so many septic tank systems. In porous limestone that is almost like direct dumping. It costs money to build a sewage treatment plant but almost nothing to pass laws against boaters. Then again you can always blame it on Miami. Then again it might just be something that enviromental extremists have invented.
 
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john today

what the heck

i figure that the water will be good up till i die so what the hey...party hardy fellers..
 
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Cathy Alcorn

Now look at the mess we've made...

Unfortunate. I was thinking that this was one of those lists without name calling and flame fests...guess I was wrong. What could have been good informative conversation has been reduced to reactionary positioning and pointless drivel complete with the predictable talk radio labeling. I'm pretty sure that we all can find incivility and auto-authoritarian puffery enough without looking for it on a sailing list. For those that answered the question without an axe to grind, a book to sell or whatever, thank you. As for the rest of it, count me out. Listmaster please remove me from this list.
 
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Tom Ehmke

Grow up, Cathy

This site is and always has been about boating information. At times the conversations get testy, but what the hell... that's life. Noone needs to remove your name from anything, just don't go there any more until you want good information again. Doggone it, whining about whining... What next. Tom
 
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Jose Venegas

The question is not ....

I agree with Cathy that this forum should be a place for rational debate and not for name calling or talk radio labeling. The question is not whether, or how much, boaters contribute to pollution in our coasts. The issue is that man-made pollution does affect the ocean and we sailors and boaters are prone to loose more than any body else. Yes, one can argue that in some places the effect of sewage discharge from boaters may be minimal compared with that coming from towns and factories. However, if we want to have any moral ground to demand from our government and officials to clean up ocean discharges, WHICH I THINK MOST OF UF AGREE UPON, we should be willing to bite the bullet and embrace the highest standards, even recognizing that it may be a real inconvenience and that most of the problem may not be caused by boaters. Only then we can demand with a straight face to our non-boater fellow citizens and government to clean up. Can we say that, because we are few, we can dump our feces in the water while we criticize the rest for doing the same thing? Yes, we can research the topic to death until even the most skeptical are convinced that the coastal environment is being affected. The risk is that then it may be too late to fix the damage or, if we are lucky, we may have to wait for decades before the measures taken reverse the effects of our carelessness. From well documented cases we know what happens and it make sense to avoid it. As primary users of our costal waters, we need to be raw models (no pun intended) and give example to the rest. Lets keep this discussion at a rational level
 
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