[Coral-List] Coral List Submission

Tom Williams ctwiliams at yahoo.com
Wed Sep 28 16:53:57 EDT 2005


UAE has undergone several similar situations and the
main issues deal with the effects on longshore
circulation and stagnation of intertidal and shallow
water.  

One problem seen in Hawaii and Majuro is that the
coral reef beds under the course may allow for piping
of "excess leachate" from the soil zones into the
groundwater - which is freshwater and will float to
the nearest shoreline.  

Include major applications of humates, and other soil
amendments to reduce water leaching, holding nutrients
in the root zones, etc.

One issue not mention is --

golf courses are to support and attract tourism
elsewise no one can afford $25,000 per green etc. The
GC is growth inducement for all of the support staff,
housing, etc. plus the users, their hotels, their
water supply/wastewater treatment, etc.   

Watch out for additional brine discharges, treated
sewage effluent, septic tank infiltration, etc.

Best of Luck -you will need it.

Tom Williams

--- andrew ross <andyroo_of72 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Eric and the Coral-List,
>  
> Eric: thanks for being so transparent with the golf
> course plan.
>  
> On the Jamaican North Coast we've got several large
> golf complexes to the East of Montego Bay.
> These courses have had great impacts on the
> watershed including modifications to drainage and
> erosion and high coastal turbidity during the
> construction phase, particularly with several large
> downpours beyond what was expected in the
> engineering and permitting. Of course these have
> done nasty things to the local coral, seagrass and
> the fishery and water based tourism products. 
>  
> In the longer term, Eric, you will need to look at
> how his grass is draining... not over the grass, but
> through it and into the ground. In Montego Bay are
> seeing enormous blooms of the green algae
> Chaetomorpha, beginning a few weeks after the
> beginning of the summer rains in the vicinity of
> these golf courses, likely responding to fertilizers
> coming in from underground drainages. Eric, if
> you've not got a complete, impermeable barrier
> underneath your grass collecting your fertilized
> irrigation water, it will go into the underlying
> sand/gravel/water table and onto your reef and
> corals... some 45 feet away.
> I'll reckon that other respondents have mentioned
> the potential impacts to your golf product in terms
> of coastal erosion and reduced general aesthetics
> with any reduction to these corals, so I'll not go
> into those.
>  
> Thanks again, and i hope we are being helpful,
>  
>  
> Andrew Ross
>  
> 
> Vanese Flood <> wrote:
> Hi Erik,
> I'm surprised at the comment "with bleaching, etc
> there are more pressing issues in the coral world". 
> At this point, all corals that are in healthy
> condition should be kept that way precisely because
> of
> coral bleaching on other reefs.
> Additionally, mangroves are "wetlands". They are
> important buffers to both land from hurricane damage
> and to reefs from land run-off. The affects of last
> year's Tsunami were greatly worsened in areas where
> mangroves had been cut back for commercial fish
> farming. The golf course construction must be
> costing
> millions. Surely they should protect their
> investment
> by letting nature provide an important buffer from
> storm erosion. Mangroves will provide this. As for a
> "wet land" buffer for runoff from
> the fertilizer -- does anyone on the list know if
> mangroves can serve in this way??
> In addition to this, mangroves are important fish
> hatcheries/nurseries. Get the fishermen and dive
> operators involved in this project. I'll stick my
> neck out here and say that THERE is a direct effect
> on
> fish populations when mangroves have been depleted.
> The more involvement from various other businesses
> in
> the area, the stronger your argument to get the
> developers to work with you.
> Good luck, and keep us posted on the development. 
> Vanese Flood
> 
> --- Erik Gauger wrote:
> 
> > At the beginning of this week, Kalai posted a
> public
> > reply to my
> > email about Guana Cay. He asked, "how close is the
> > reef to the
> > golf course?"
> > 
> > The answer is that the reef is 45 feet from the
> > shore. There is a
> > photo here. The land is a proposed fairway.
> > 
> >
>
http://www.notesfromtheroad.com/WestIndies/bakers_bay_intro4.htm
> > 
> > I have received over 50 gracious replies to my
> > original query. It
> > may take me a few weeks to respond to everybody. 
> > However, the
> > assistance I have received has been enormous. I
> > understand that
> > with bleaching, etc there are more pressing issues
> > in the coral
> > world.
> > 
> > I want to make it clear that the proposed golf
> > course is very
> > 'green' and that this issue is one of 'best
> > practices' versus 'what
> > will actually happen to the reef.' The golf course
> > uses seagrass
> > paspalam, and the land will be terraformed so that
> > the runoff from
> > the fertilizer will go into a manmade wetlands
> (the
> > mangroves are
> > being cleared for a 250 slip marina).
> > 
> > Several of you have written me that golf courses
> can
> > be built in a
> > very green way. I am familiar with such golf
> course
> > projects in
> > places like Hawaii, where the golf course and reef
> > are separated by
> > hundreds of yards and even hills. Guana Cay is
> very
> > different
> > because it is a tiny island only an 1/8th of a
> mile
> > wide and seven
> > miles long. The 250 boat marina will be dredged
> > from mangroves or
> > wetlands, and will be as close to the reef as the
> > Disney dredging
> > project, which was estimated to have killed off
> 1/3
> > of the corals
> > on the Northeastern edge of the island.
> > 
> > A large pdf of the golf course plan:
> > 
> >
>
http://www.discoverylandco.com/images/bakersbay/illustrative_plan.p
> > df
> > 
> > and my map of the island:
> > 
> >
>
http://www.notesfromtheroad.com/WestIndies/guana_map.html
> > 
> > Thanks for all your assistance in helping someone
> > from the outside.
> > 
> > Erik
> > > 
> 
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> protection around 
> http://mail.yahoo.com 
> _______________________________________________
> Coral-List mailing list
> Coral-List at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
>
http://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/mailman/listinfo/coral-list
> 




More information about the Coral-List mailing list