Here is a story of something I would never experience had I not lived here. Makes me happy to be where I am.

I went fishing with a friend today, and had a rather unique experience. He happens to work at a local nuclear power plant, and have access to their property, so the two of us were able to fish Big Mud Creek, a place off limits to the general public. I’ve been there before with him several times, and it’s an interesting place for several reasons.

The first is that Big Mud Creek is a sheltered cove that seems to always have tarpon jumping or rolling. I’m sure there are other places like this, but I’ve never seen a place before that has this much tarpon activity.

The other is the protected nature of the waterways that are used to cool the power plant. As I understand it, water is brought in from the ocean, used to cool the reactor, safely of course, and then dumped back out, as warmer water. This gives us a localized ecosystem that offers aquatic species normally found much further south.

As the water is pumped through these channels, all sorts of marine life come into the canals. As the channels narrow, large nets are strung across them to prevent anything large from getting trapped or blocking the cooling system.

This leaves a constant flow in front of the net that acts as a funnel for fish and other marine creatures…. a funnel that acts as a feeding trough for large predators, such as Goliath grouper.

When we fish the piers at Big Mud Creek, armed security always stop by to check credentials. Seeing armed guards heading towards us was a bit unsettling the first time it happened, I must admit. After a few trips out there, I grew accustomed to the situation.

Today, however, two vehicles approached, faster than normal, catching my attention. Behind them, also heading towards us, was a golf cart towing a trailer. All eyes seemed to be watching the trailer, not us.

Two armed security guards exited their vehicles and approached us. After a cursory inspection of our credentials, they turned to watch the approaching golf cart. It carried two men that seemed to be in a hurry to get somewhere. My paranoia kicked in and I thought they were a getaway vehicle of some sort. But why would they be heading towards us, an obvious dead end ending at an old boat ramp with no other possible escape?

What the hell was going on?

It soon became apparent as they stopped and unloaded a dump cart that obviously had a heavy load. Oblivious to my friend and I, the two men wheeled the dump cart to the end of the boat ramp and dumped the contents….a massive fish!

After the show was over, they left, as did the security guards. About twenty minutes later, they returned to repeat the process, this time with only one security guard watching. I spoke with the fish wranglers and found that they were in charge of removing the trapped marine life. Today it just happened to be Goliath grouper.

I was told that each was caught on rod and reel, then weighed, tagged, and DNA samples taken for research by the state and several state colleges. Each fish is then released on the river side in order for the fish to not immediately swim right back into the intake, getting trapped again. I was told that they used to dump them into the ocean, but were finding the same fish returning in a matter of days, only to become a problem again. By dumping them into the river, a journey of roughly 18 miles via the northern route, or 30 miles for the southern route. Either way, it keep the large fish away for a longer period of time.

Sounds a bit like a fish story, right? Well, like any non-believer, you should be saying “Pictures, or it didn’t happen”.

So click on Page 2 below and enjoy!

Peace,
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