# The Dead Zone.



## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

Who is contributing and what are they going to do about it.

Regards, Mike

https://www.agweb.com/article/largest-recorded-dead-zone-calls-for-nutrient-loss-reduction-naa-sonja-begemann/


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

I cannot speak for that situation, but I know here in Maine us farmers were accused of contributing to contamination in a lake, locally called Unity Pond, though it is a lake and quite large in size.

Anyway the local Soil and Water Conservation District REFUSED to put in their State and Federal Dues because they wanted to push the issue. Here is what actually happened.

The Dept of Environmental Protection gave a grant to a Senator's son to do a water study of Unity Pond. He left the Soil and Water Conservation District's office in Belfast and returned 40 minutes later. A few months go by and he draws up this lengthy document stating farmers were contributing to the pollution of the lake.

This did not make sense. First it takes 20 minutes to drive from Belfast to Unity Pond...the guy did nothing more then drive there, get a water sample, and come back. Second, the land base here is 90% forest and 10% fields, even if farmers were contributing, forest land is a filter and there just plain is not enough fields for so much contamination to come from. We all knew the answer...

Unity Pond had tons of camps on it in the 1960's, but starting in the 1970's these camps were converted to year around dwellings. Septic systems were "grandfathered" so as not to have to pay exorbitant fees to build leach fields near a lake, and on non-existing land. In other words their sewer lines went right into the lake. When the conservation district hired divers to trace these sewer pipes back, things got ugly.

The conservation district was told to shut up and just blame the farmers so that farmers could get more EQUIP Money, but the Conservation District said right is right, and wrong is wrong. In the end the state built new septic leach fields for a few homes on the lake, but it was a token gesture. In other words it was swept under the rug...or flushed into the lake as it is. Nothing truly changed.

I don't know about the cited situation, but having witnessed this, I always wonder about who really is to blame.


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## Farmerbrown2 (Sep 25, 2018)

Ain't it funny how homeowners ,golf courses ,municipalities and industry never have anything to do with water contamination.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

Well I am pretty sure that Ag shares in this problem.....but there is plenty of blame to go around. When you see high levels of Phosphorous in river systems, ag is almost always a contributor. We need to take responsibility as stewards of our environment to be able to have credibility amongst the less informed.

Regards, Mike


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## hog987 (Apr 5, 2011)

I dont understand why anywhere where there is lots of this type of algae growing. Why dont they go out and harvest the algae, dry it, turn it into a small pellet or prill and than sell it as an organic fertilizer? Instead of saying we have a problem and start playing the blame game. Plus in some cases putting toxic stuff in the water to kill the algae. Turn these disasters into an opportunity.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

hog987 said:


> I dont understand why anywhere where there is lots of this type of algae growing. Why dont they go out and harvest the algae, dry it, turn it into a small pellet or prill and than sell it as an organic fertilizer? Instead of saying we have a problem and start playing the blame game. Plus in some cases putting toxic stuff in the water to kill the algae. Turn these disasters into an opportunity.


Well that would be a good thing in certain situations but in the Mississippi river the phosphates wash down stream without really forming algae due to the water flow.....so they don't really overwhelm until they are dumped and settle into the Gulf estuaries and ocean. From what I understand, at that point it creates more of a lack of oxygen than physical algae.

Regards, Mike


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

I would not be so quick to point to the farmers.

Our rivers have the same issue and it causes a algae bloom that ends up shutting down our shellfish industries like mussels and clams which in Maine is BIG business. But as I said, there is not enough land base in Maine used in farming to blame it on that.

The culprit is the waste water treatment plants. They are designed to take so much flow, but in big rain events, or snow melt, they just cannot handle that much water all at once so some is sent downstream untreated. This happens everywhere because frankly it would cost way too much to build every waste water treatment plant so that it could handle a 25 year flood.

No waste water treatment facility is bad; they are a very important answer to a problem, but in big rain events they can only do so much. This is not some conspiracy or big secret, I know it was common knowledge on the Soil and Water Conservation District that after a lot of rain, the clam flats in our county would be shut down due to "red tide" which is another name for algae bloom.

I will conceded that there is a lot more farm land that sheds into the Mississippi River then what happens here, but there are plenty of waste water treatment plants too along the way.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

RuttedField said:


> But as I said, there is not enough land base in Maine used in farming to blame it on that.
> 
> I will conceded that there is a lot more farm land that sheds into the Mississippi River then what happens here, but there are plenty of waste water treatment plants too along the way.


There are no doubt water treatments facilities that release their effluent into the Mississippi, but they pale in comparison to the agricultural land found along both banks from Minnesota to the Gulf.

Yes, I would say there is a lot more farm land contributing compared to Maine....by many hundreds of miles...on both sides of the river.

Regards, Mike


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## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

Yeah the potato ground is the culprit around here. They can measure levels related to rain events. The base load of water / sewer discharge is fairly steady all the time.


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

I agree completely. I am just saying that the farmer is not completely to blame.

Sometimes I just feel like we feed 99-1/2 % of the population, and 98% of them them are convinced we are out to kill them.


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