Another Artificial Reef Success Story

An article on artificial reefs back east:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/08/us/08reef.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Sigh when is California going to wake up?!?!?!?!   

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/08/us/08reef.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

The Monterey bay marine sanctuary, which covers most of central california, prohibits any type of habitat modification, including enhancement.  Pretty much the stick your fingers in your ears and go 'lalalalalala' style of caring for the environment.  There are quite successful artificial reefs in socal.  The best reefs are made with concrete rubble from demolitions at sites near barge access, as far as cost/quality goes.  The scrap steel in subway cars is probably more valuable than scrap concrete.

How about this?

http://www.nmreef.com/AboutTheReef.aspx

Also the Gulf of the Farallones and the Cordell Banks NMS's.  You know those wacky Caliviros, habitat enhancement and oil rigs are one and the same.    

I think too many non-fishers think artifical reefs like these are ugly (not that they can actually see them) and abhor the idea of dumping stuff like old subway cars into the ocean.   There is also the question as to whether these reefs actually provide new essential habitat for fish (thus increasing the overall fish population) or are simply large fish attracting devices concentrating the fish so that they can be caught by fishers.  I personally believe in the improved habitat and I'm glad some states are able to go ahead with this, not to mention the bonus of finding a use for old subway cars.

Is the mothball fleet doing anything good for the environment where it is now? It is so frustrating to see great success in rebuilding habitat in other places like Texas and Florida while CA seems to just want to pretend that it will all just get better on its own.

The mothball fleet is a whole an environmental problem of its own. Military vessels like those have tons of noxious chemicals in them, sinking them in the ocean will certainly cause some leaching. 

I believe there has been some attempts to send some of them all the way through the Panama Canal via barge to Texas to turn them into scrap.  The were going to send them up here to Portland, but Oregon was afraid of all the non-native nasty fouling organisms on the bottom of the hulls.  I'm not sure where this stands.

There are people that clean them up pretty well. At least well enough to sink in FL and TX.

Oil rigs and the like do concentrate pelagic fish, much as floating debris do - just on a larger scale.  For reef fish though, artificial reefs ARE new habitat that will result in an increased fish population.  If we carpeted the coast with rock, it'd be carpeted with rockfish soon enough.

Artificial reefs could also do quite a bit for water quality because reefs support more filter feeding organisms and plant life (which hoover up nutrients).  For ocean habitat enhancement, putting artificial reefs around creek/river outlets could work double duty in providing habitat and improving water quality.  It's 90+% sand out there and reefs are like oasis of life in the desert.

That's it...when I go, I'm going to borrow the idea from the Neptune Society's "Atlantis" project down off the Florida coast.  I'm going to have my cremated remains mixed in with about 300 pounds of concrete and made into a statue...I'm thinking of something along the lines of Johnny Cash's ad in Billboard magazine where he literally gave the industry the finger for their lack of support for what turned out to be his Grammy winning "Unchained" album.



Only I want the statue to be holding a fishing pole instead of a guitar, and wearing a t-shirt that says "Bite Me".  Then my NCKA buddies can surreptitiously lower said statue into place somewhere appropriate...say the Pinnacles down out of Stillwater, so all of those divers who fought so hard to make that a no-fishing zone can see my true feelings for eternity. 

Who else is with me?  I figure over a few decades we can slowly create our own artificial reef! 

Please send me GPS coordinates after you die.

There are people that clean them up pretty well. At least well enough to sink in FL and TX.

Yeah, I was gonna say. I remember a show on discovery about sinking an old aircraft carrier as an artificial reef. I guess it's a state thing then huh?

Z

Please send me GPS coordinates after you die.

How would that be possible?????

Come on Guys, stop knocking CA. The Golden State was making reefs way before others, as far back as 1951. Plus, because this was in the days before fishfinders, the navy folks made sure the fish would glow in the dark by using a boat loaded with radioactive waste!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Independence_%28CVL-22%29