Divers clean up Boca Grande Pass

[CBulla]

Wanted to share an article about an event local that Reefguy and I participated in over the past few days. If you got the News-Press site there is also a pic to go with the article - its different than the one in the news paper. One thing that Jeff and I both agreed upon after the dives, aside from doing something cool for the environment, this has to be one of the best Gulf Coast dives that we've done. My opinion is that it is these last 4 dives were the coolest I've done in my life, and thanks to some incredible vis we really got to see some fairly undisturbed (except anchors and line, monofilament, jigs and leads hung up) habitat that is absolutely thriving with life!

note:This dive is not for the faint of heart. Day 1 dives were done hanging onto the bottom with your hands in holes that house stone crabs - at 15' down the line you could clearly see the bottom in all directions, bottom at our location was 60' with a max of 65'. Day 2 dives were fall back into water moving fast enough to race you away from your boat before you could grab the line to pull yourself to the anchor line to descent into mask flooding current.. However at 30' the current stopped and at 50' we had a clear view of the bottom 30' below. We were lucky! Video from last year showed vis that was roughly 10'!!

-pictures and video will be available soon.

http://www.news-press.com/news/local_state/040330bocagrande.html

Divers clean up Boca Grande Pass

Two tons of debris pulled from bottom

By KEVIN LOLLAR, klollar@news-press.com
Published by news-press.com on March 30, 2004

Seventy-degree water and a jet-stream current Monday made Boca Grande Pass an inhospitable dive site.

Despite the difficult conditions, 47 volunteer divers pulled about 4,000 pounds of debris from the bottom of the pass during the third annual Boca Grande Pass Cleanup, which concludes today.


Will Smith of Cape Coral struggles with heavy current and an abandoned crab trap Monday during the Boca Grande Pass Cleanup. Forty-seven divers pulled more than a ton of debris from the pass.
CHOPS HANCOCK/news-press.com
“We’re beginning to see that some areas are looking better and better,” said Bob Wasno, event coordinator and Florida Sea Grant agent. “I think we’re making progress on the garbage, and, over time, it’s going to be more of a maintenance project than a cumulative cleanup.

“And we always get more debris on the second day because we know after the first day which areas to target.”

More than 20 boats ferried the divers from Boca Grande to the pass, as Sanibel marine officers, Lee County sheriff’s deputies and state marine officers patrolled the area to keep other boats away and help any divers who got into trouble.

Among the groups supplying divers or boats were the South and Southwest Florida water management districts, the Florida, Boca Grande and Lee County fishing guides associations, Keep Lee County Beautiful, Mote Marine Laboratory and the Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program.

Under Wasno’s direction, splash time was set for 9 a.m., but the incoming tide was so strong that only a handful got in the water on schedule. The rest opted to wait until the tide slacked off a little.

Aboard Henry Nachtsheim’s 25-foot boat Soon Come, Nachtsheim, 53, of Sanibel, and Will Smith, 35, of Cape Coral, decided to face the current.

Rather than simply dropping to the bottom, the divers had to pull themselves down the anchor line against the in-rushing tide.

On a ledge at 50 feet, drift algae blew through the cold water like leaves in a stiff wind; snapper and grouper struggled against the flow or just went with it; a 200-pound Goliath grouper faced into the current with its belly partly buried in the sand, not even moving as divers pulled an anchor line from the sand around it.

“The current was impressive,” Smith said. “It was hard to get a lot of garbage up with that much current. God needed to give us a third arm to do it.”

By 11 a.m., the tide had backed off enough for most of the other divers to get wet, but more than one diver was swept away and had to be retrieved by Capt. Joe Nygaard and firefighter Robert Popkin on the Sanibel Fire Department’s personal watercraft.

Armed with half-bushel mesh citrus bags, the divers brought up bottles, cans, fishing lures, fishing weights, shoes, anchor lines, anchors, crab traps and great spaghetti wads of monofilament.

“The dives were awesome,” said Tomma Barnes, a senior environmental scientist for the South Florida Water Management District, who didn’t make the first, full-force dive. “Last year, the clarity was bad, and Bob (Wasno) crashed me in the face, cracked my nose, knocked my mask off, and then just went swimming off.”

Although he didn’t dive, FWC Commissioner Dick Corbett was on hand for the cleanup.

“The most important thing I saw today was a volunteer effort to clean up the environment of Florida,” he said. “With the significant increases in population, the tragic cluttering of the bottom of Boca Grande Pass must stop.”

Not everything went as planned Monday.

On his third dive, during which he was surrounded by a large school of tarpon, Smith attached two citrus bags full of lead weights to the Soon Come’s anchor line, the idea being that he and Nachtsheim could bring the bags to the boat when they weighed anchor.

When bags and anchor proved too heavy to bring up by hand, the crew of a Charlotte Marine Research Team vessel attached the line to a winch, but as they brought the anchor up, the bags broke free.

“Oh! I knew that was going to happen,” Smith said. “Well, it’s the old thought that counts — isn’t that what they say?”

On a more positive note, Nachtsheim said he’d marked the spot and would get the bags today.

As one of the few volunteers to make three dives, Smith summed up the day:

“The camaraderie was great — everybody was out for a good cause. Outside of a little bit of current, the diving was good. It was good seeing tarpon coming back to Boca Grande to do their thing.

“But it was disappointing that our lead ended up back on the bottom.”

 

[Marvel]

Most impressive! We need more guys like you around. Thanks to all for their efforts.

 

[ReefGuy]

It's too bad they didn't take time to educate boaters in the article. It was a very good thing we had so many law enforcement boats with us. They were very busy all day both days preventing boats from motoring through our little flotilla at full throttle. Those dudes from the Sanibel police department were insane! A large boat was motoring through and just wouldn't stop. The police came up on them with lights and sirens, but they still wouldn't stop. The police ended up cutting across his bow (maybe 10' away - both boats cruising) and swerving back, throwing tons of wake over the bow. He finally stopped just short of the boats. Another boater came in and actually tried to drop lines into the water. We were yelling and pointing to the flag, and the guys just flipped us off. Their attitude changed when the Lee county sheriffs department explained the facts of the situation to them . It's simply amazing how many (mainly LARGE) boats tried to motor right through our group of 21 boats. Despite the fact that NONE of the boats even had fishing rods aboard, were all flying those silly orange and white flags, were ringed by law enforcement agencies and even had a jet ski in the water with large block "RESCUE UNIT" on it. The law enforcement and rescue guys (paramedics were on Boca Grande's south beach standing by both days) really had their work cut out for them - it would have been impossible without them.

For those unfamaliar with Boca grande, if you look at a map of Florida, on the west coast, you will see two large harbors. The northern one is Tampa, the southern one is Charlotte harbor. What the maps don't usually show are the barrier islands (which pretty much encircle the state). The main inlet to Charlotte harbor is about 1 mile wide, bordered on the north by Boca Grande, and the south by Cayo Costa. Most of the water that moves in and out of Charlotte harbor flows through here, causing unbelievable currents (10 knots is not even unusual). Maximum depth for me this weekend was 81', which is about max for the pass. Average is 35-50'.

This attracts large amounts of tarpon (the pass is considered world class in tarpon fishing) and, of course, their preditors. "Old Hitler", a local legend - a 20+ foot hammerhead, is said to cruise through here, and during tarpon season the pass is filled with large hammerheads and bulls who will gladly dine on tarpon right at the side of the boats. The charter captains we were with said that they had witnessed as many as 5 large bulls feeding at the side of their boat on tarpon they were trying to unhook. Large Goliath groupers also call this area home. Combined with a typical gulf visibility of 2-10', this is an intimidating area to dive.

On Monday, cbulla and I were diving in an estimated 6 knot current, which really the only difficulty. The tarpon weren't back yet in any number to draw a lot of big predators, and we didn't see a shark either day (although other divers report seeing some). Saw some LARGE goliaths, tons of snapper (literally), a really nice hog, some large stingrays (4' diameter). Visibility was an unbelievable 30+ feet. Apart from all of the crap on the bottom, it was a really beautiful dive.

We made a dent, but there's still a lot more out there. This weeks' dive was year 3 of a 10 year cleanup effort, and divers from past years confirmed that we are making a difference down there, but for every anchor we were able to pull up, there were 5 that we couldn't. We didn't even touch lead or jigs, concentraing on entanglement dangers, which included mono (often 100lb test), ropes and anchor chains, and even coax cable (don't ask me, but it was there ).

We also attended a workshop last week on invasive species in the gulf and were trained to spot several species for Mote marine lab (who also was present, along with several other conservation agencies - we'll post a list, because these people deserve a lot of credit) including green muscles and spotted jellyfish. Didn't see any of either, though.


Finally, to those that claim that split fins suck in a current. NOT. I wore mine both days and didn't have any more problems than anyone else.

 

[biggsy]

Great article and great work by the two of you Colin as well as all of the other divers. This is the first time I have heard of this. Very interesting!

biggsy

 

[CBulla]

Thanks Biggsy! Since this is my first year playing, I didnt know what to expect with the dive so I didnt really post anything here. After spending a few days diving the pass with Reefguy and all the other volunteers and organizers of the event, I'm kind of sad I didnt but glad at that same time. As Reefguy can attest, it wasnt a hop in the water and look at the fish dive; this was one of those dives where confidence in your skills, gear competentcy, and the ability to not panic in adverse conditions was of the absolute paramount. Its very understandable why its asked that divers with AOW and experience to back it is requested (exceptions can be made). I'll be honest and tell ya I had butterflies on and off right up to the point of splash, then it was business hat on!

A cool bonus was getting some education from Mote Marine and the Florida Sea Grant on some specific things they wanted us to look for during the dive and any future dives we do anywhere on this coast!

 

[ReefGuy]

Thanks too, Biggsy. It was a little nerve-wrecking, but a little better because of the vis. We grew up with pictures of large sharks from the pass and a lot of sea stories. Combined with the video we saw at the workshop, where everything was dark and eerie, I was really nervous until the bottom came into view. After that, it became a matter of trying not to get swept away. It was definately my biggest skill test so far. I was glad to have CBulla there, as we have dove together a lot and I have total confidence in his abilities.

I can't wait until next year (unless, of course, they do this again at the end of season...)

 

[fgray1]

If they would mark an area for divers only. Then we all could see what in there.
Maybe if we got it all together and offered to help clean it up they might consider it. Any Idea who we could contact to see if this might be done. Maybe bouy an area off. I'll bet if we asked and offered they might do it.
Fred

 

[CBulla]

I'm working with the people who put this together alraedy. Its sponsored and organized by the Florida Sea Grant. I've got some ideas that will get more of these occuring and give an opportunity for more divers to get in and really put their skills to the test!

 

[fgray1]

You let me know when and where.
Fred

 

[DennisW]

I know and dive with a couple of those Lee County Sheriff's office guys that were also cleaning up the pass. They are great guys and fun to dive with as well. It is amazing how stupid people with boats can be. Some states require a license to run a boat. I'm not so sure it shouldn't be required everywhere. Thanks for your effort in keeping the waters clean.