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NFC: Eulogy to a Ditch.
Eulogy to a Ditch
Robert Rice
robertrice at juno_com
It is a small insignificant ditch 100 or so yards long and
at its widest maybe a foot or so. It empties it's
insignificance into the Santa Rosa sound. It's head is a
small stockpot sized boiling spring long since stuck in a
pipe. Not the type of thing you would have noticed unless
you were a fish, a bird or some other wild thing but I did.
It runs in and out of maze of concrete pipes all along its
stretch. By the Pak n Fax a pipe, By the Regions Bank a
pipe, under the highway another pipe until now its biggest
open stretch is 15 or so feet. It has been pretty
effectively tamed. It causes no real concern for most folks
. They drive over it or by it every day on highway 98 on
their way to work, play , or other important things. All the
while this tiny ditch in rain or shine , drought or flood
has kept trickling on. I doesn't flood it doesn't dry out it
just carries on. A fact the birds, fish and other wild
things surely appreciate
It surprised me a lot the first time I sampled it . It had
at its head end it had a eclectic mix of fish including,
everglades pygmy sunfish, a colorful strain of Hetereandria
Formosa and Gambusia. A surprising diversity for a detached
coastal spring. How they got there is anyone's guess . Maybe
this little ditch was once attached to someplace else . Not
anymore though it stands alone as the last of its type in my
home town. At the sound end were a Seminole killies. Adena
xenica, mullet, pinfish and an odd visitor from the sound.
Pretty neat ditch for the aquarist or school teacher to
dabble into. I don't know if there were any other dabblers
out there as far as I know though me and my daughter Erin
were it's lone visitors.
I changed my tense because you see it is gone now. The last
time we visited it something significant happened. While
stopping in at the Pak n Fax parking lot next to the roasted
peanut lady to do some collecting a large truck came. It
dropped off 36 inch plastic blue pipe and bulldozers and the
like. Someone, somewhere decided it was progress to
completely cover this insignificant little ditch. It would
look so much neater to have asphalt all the way from parking
lot to the highway. Not that it looked bad now , but someone
thought asphalt would look better. Having seen asphalt I
tend to disagree but my opinion was never ask. So the
Heterandria with the cute redspot were sacrificed to the
rechanneling and piping of the ditch. The evergladi had
disappeared several years earlier after the installation of
pipes for some new business. Turbidity, isolation and
rechannelling took care of those small egglayers. Then only
the live bearers were left. Now they also are gone. I ask
why, it was explained as flood control . I wondered aloud
at 30 yards from the sound how much flood control could it
be ? It did not matter ultimately. It all basically came
down to control. People in control are not satisfied with
the way things are and they want to fix it. Not that most of
us ever thought it was broke . In this case it didn't matter
much. The non broken ditch was removed much the way a
surgeon removes an offending mole.
So I sat alone one afternoon in the Pak and Fax parking
watching them scoop out a new channel. In no time the ditch
became a muddy mess loaded into the backs of trucks and
hauled off to the landfill or where ever old ditches go. I
decided progress has no heart or much good science. I don't
think the people who did this are bad people , I don't think
they even considered that little ditch at all. It was an
object to be moved , shaped and terminated at their leisure.
It never was to them anything alive . It was just in the
way. To the wild things that lived there it mattered greatly
to me it mattered less and to those in charge it mattered
not at all.
A few of the Heterandria with the red spots exists still
today in isolated colonies around the country but they are
pretty much gone. I keep a colony up in my garage. Sooner or
later I will move and have to give up my colony. That local
strain will interbreed with other domestic Heterandria and
add their genes to the greater pool. That strain, that
ditch, that place is gone now. The fish, the birds , the
wild things miss it much more than I do. That was their home
, water source and perhaps their life. It's all gone now
though. Its not easy for a wild thing to get a clean drink
of water on the Gulf of Mexico and now in my neck of the
woods it just got a bit harder. I know today the price of
"progress" , it costs a small insignificant ditch next to a
highway, now covered in plastic blue pipe and 6 inches of
asphalt.
I strongly encourage aquarist to get involved in local
conservation issues. Please take the time to share with your
friends/children about local species. Take an afternoon, a
jar an aquarium net and a Peterson's Field Guide to
Freshwater Fishes and see what you see. It's the best way to
learn about our wonderful native fauna ! Consider getting
involved in conservation of, aquarium rearing or studying
your local species. You might be the first one to
successfully breed and rear a common local species or even
discover a new one!
I am involved with the Native Fish Conservancy (NFC) a not
for profit aquarist friendly conservation organization. I
recommend you check into the following resources NFC
(NFC at actwin_com) , NANFA and aquarium organization for NA
native fish enthusiasts (WWW.NANFA.ORG) and your local
state natural resources department they have many cool books
about the wild things in your state at very reasonable cost.
If you would like to reach me try email robertrice at juno_com
or by SASE at 2213 Prytania Circle Navarre Florida 32566.
Robert Rice
Check out our exotics Removal Program and breeders program visit our website
http://nativefish.interspeed.net