Boating restrictions due to mussels?

On May 13, 9:28 pm, "Mike" wrote:
I don't know if you saw it yet Mike, but the SCVWD has just banned all
boating in the Santa Clara County resevoirs until they can put an inspection
plan in place. It's supposed to be close to 100 degrees here on Thursday,
and I had planned to play hookie and hang out at Anderson. This sucks. I
don't care what kind of inspections they have, it seems inevitable that the
friggin' mussels will find there way in eventually. They ought to be
spending money to figure out how to get rid of them.

Yep, I heard. I got on the computer that afternoon to see when the
meeting was. I assumed that since it was on a weekday and open to the
public, it would be held in the early evening. Imagine my surprise to
find that it had already been held and boating of any kind was banned.

I ended up sending a nastygram to 'the board' and two PR people from
the county. Got an email back from one of the county folks (who was on
vacation) the next day saying they would refund the $ for my passes.
Three other new county folks were CC'ed in the reply, so they have a
plan in that regard. It wasn't really what I was hoping to hear.

Now they are talking about charging more than $7 for an inspection.
Owning a second local only boat would be great (hypothetically it
would only need one inspection per year), but I already pay $71 a
month to store the one I have. This doesn't sound good at all. It's
something that has to be done though. Only one reservoir in No Cal has
been found with only one of the two species. From what I've been
reading, these inspections are very thorough. I hope the mussels
aren't inevitable. And that eventually the inspections are no longer
needed. We will see.

-mike

On Thu, 15 May 2008 15:14:06 -0700 (PDT), phishrace
wrote:

I hope the mussels
aren't inevitable. And that eventually the inspections are no longer
needed.

That is a fond dream The chestnut blight and the Dutch elm got them
all.

Casady

I think it's inevitable that they'll eventually be everywhere. Inspections
may delay that, but it's a waste of time and money as far as I'm concerned.
Too little too late. Now they need to focus on control or eradication. I
already read someplace else that someone wanted to get a bag of these
mussels and let them loose in the resevoirs... then inspections will no
longer be necessary. I hope he/she was joking, but there is a method to that
madness.

The fee doesn't really bother me that much. I too, generally get a yearly
pass for my tow rig and boat. Mine doesn't expire until the end of this
month actually. Another 7 bucks won't kill me. Especially since it'll only
be if I go to another out of county lake between launches.

What they should do is eliminate the friggin' $6 fee to make a launch
reservation between Memorial and Labor Day. That's the fee that really
****es me off, especially if you have already bought the season pass. Most
of my boating is at Anderson. What will really bug me though, is the
additional time for the inpections at premium launch times. THAT, will be a
royal PITA.

--Mike

"phishrace" wrote in message
...
On May 13, 9:28 pm, "Mike" wrote:
I don't know if you saw it yet Mike, but the SCVWD has just banned all
boating in the Santa Clara County resevoirs until they can put an
inspection
plan in place. It's supposed to be close to 100 degrees here on Thursday,
and I had planned to play hookie and hang out at Anderson. This sucks. I
don't care what kind of inspections they have, it seems inevitable that
the
friggin' mussels will find there way in eventually. They ought to be
spending money to figure out how to get rid of them.

Yep, I heard. I got on the computer that afternoon to see when the
meeting was. I assumed that since it was on a weekday and open to the
public, it would be held in the early evening. Imagine my surprise to
find that it had already been held and boating of any kind was banned.

I ended up sending a nastygram to 'the board' and two PR people from
the county. Got an email back from one of the county folks (who was on
vacation) the next day saying they would refund the $ for my passes.
Three other new county folks were CC'ed in the reply, so they have a
plan in that regard. It wasn't really what I was hoping to hear.

Now they are talking about charging more than $7 for an inspection.
Owning a second local only boat would be great (hypothetically it
would only need one inspection per year), but I already pay $71 a
month to store the one I have. This doesn't sound good at all. It's
something that has to be done though. Only one reservoir in No Cal has
been found with only one of the two species. From what I've been
reading, these inspections are very thorough. I hope the mussels
aren't inevitable. And that eventually the inspections are no longer
needed. We will see.

-mike

On May 15, 9:33*pm, (Richard Casady)
wrote:
That is a fond dream The chestnut blight and the Dutch elm got them
all.

Union Carbide seems to do well at killing things. I bet they'll come
out with Mussel-B-Gone (safe for the kids too!) in no time. Remember,
you read it here first. d;^)

I bet Monsanto and others have already got folks working on this.
Water districts would pay huge money to safely rid these things from
their reservoirs. Convincing the public to allow whatever they come up
with to be added to their drinking water is a whole different story
however. We'll see.

-mike

On May 15, 10:38*pm, "Mike" wrote:
I think it's inevitable that they'll eventually be everywhere. Inspections
may delay that, but it's a waste of time and money as far as I'm concerned..
Too little too late. Now they need to focus on control or eradication. I
already read someplace else that someone wanted to get a bag of these
mussels and let them loose in the resevoirs... then inspections will no
longer be necessary. I hope he/she was joking, but there is a method to that
madness.

The fee doesn't really bother me that much. I too, generally get a yearly
pass for my tow rig and boat. Mine doesn't expire until the end of this
month actually. Another 7 bucks won't kill me. Especially since it'll only
be if I go to another out of county lake between launches.

What they should do is eliminate the friggin' $6 fee to make a launch
reservation between Memorial and Labor Day. That's the fee that really
****es me off, especially if you have already bought the season pass. Most
of my boating is at Anderson. What will really bug me though, *is the
additional time for the inpections at premium launch times. THAT, will be a
royal PITA.

Yes, the whole program is in bad shape. This will just make it worse.
I have lots of ideas on how they could improve things, but I'm not
sure it's worth the effort. The county and the water district seem to
have an adversarial relationship. They could learn a lot if they just
looked around.

It actually could be worse. The San Francisco water district is
probably the worst in the country as far as access goes. They have
have cabins on the water's edge at their reservoirs for the board to
use, yet they only allow the public in on guided tours. Boating and
fishing have never been seriously considered.

-mike