The US Army Corps of Engineers announced today that on Monday, October 21, they will stop all water releases from Lake Okeechobee to the St. Lucie Estuary, and furnish only beneficial releases to the Caloosahatchee Estuary. Recent dry weather and past lake releases have reduced Okeechobee's levels to about 15.5 feet, a healthy level for the Lake this time of year, and importantly, a safe level for the Hoover Dike given the present weather conditions and forecasts. The Corps will continue flows of 650 cubic feet per second to the Caloosahatchee Estuary, an amount that estuary scientists have identified as maintaining a healthy salinity for the upper estuary. The lake water will still carry excess nutrients, but for estuary health, maintaining the right salinity level is more important than avoiding moderate nutrient additions.

Unless a large rain event occurs, the harmful releases are finished for the year. Although releases will stop, the harm will be long-lasting. Seagrass beds have been lost and will take years to regrow, after which time sea grass-dependent organisms can begin recolonization. Fish, crabs, shrimp, oysters, and other organisms also will have to recolonize once the habitats and food base have had time to recover.

The Central Everglades Planning Project is the next major project that can start diverting the harmful flows like this summer away from the estuaries to the south. Going south, they can be cleaned in filter marshes and used to re-nourish the Everglades, that has chronic water shortfalls. There are other important projects to support as well, the largest being the C-43 and C-44 projects that will build large reservoirs to help reduce local runoff to the estuaries. Audubon is working to gain its approval by Congress.