Forsaken Mermaids

I grew up not very far from Blue Spring.  The springs are beautiful almost beyond description--these are the real wonders of Florida and often missed by tourists who stick to the coasts.  You can find nicer beaches in lots of places, but massive, miraculous springs like Blue Spring are rare indeed.  Now this:

The famous oceanographer Jacques Cousteau first visited northeast Florida's Blue Spring to report on the plight of the manatee in 1970. The picture then was grim. Pleasure boats jammed the creek that flows out of the spring, and the eleven manatees that sought refuge in the spring's warm waters were being harassed. Some people rode them with rope harnesses; some animals had initials carved in their backs. Even the youngest calves had propeller scars from collisions with boats traveling too fast. Then Mr. Cousteau and his son, produced a television documentary called, "The Forgotten Mermaids" and everything changed.

Floridians opened their hearts to the plant-eating mammal. Blue Spring was protected as a state park. All Florida waters became a sanctuary for manatees. The manatee population rebounded. But now the slow moving manatee has run into a new challenge.

The St. Johns River Water Management District, when it next meets on Oct. 10 may allow withdrawals that will diminish blue spring by 16 percent from its current volume---and decrease the amount of warm habitat for the animals by 37 percent. To understand the significance of that, it helps to know something about how the spring used to flow and how springs are connected underground throughout the Florida peninsula.

The idea of taking water from Blue Spring strikes me as, literally, insane.  This theft would be bad for Blue Spring, bad for the manatees, and, heck, bad for Florida.  Florida should really be avoiding further development, not courting it.

Link: Living on Earth: October 6, 2006 (transcript).

Link: Living on Earth: October 6, 2006 (scroll down for links to audio).