This image demonstrates the nitrate cycle used by the Suwannee River Water Management District in a recent Basin Management Action Plan or BMAPS Nutrient Loading presentation. Nitrates are elemental; harder to detect than e-coli: one nitrogen, three oxygen atoms: NO3. Nitrates do not filter out of sand and karst; they trickle right through. Nitrates are also common components of fertilizers and explosives. One could say that high nitrate levels lead to an explosion of algae in our springs.
Nitrates are present in our air, water, and soil, in background levels. The background ‘natural’ occurring level in our springs is .05 mg/L. This second chart, provided by the Suwannee River Water Management District SRWMD for the BMAPS nutrient presentation, shows the high nitrate levels at Devil’s Ear. “The 0.35mg/L concentration is the state water quality limit for nitrates in springs and is about seven times higher than the natural background. The nitrate concentration in Ginnie Spring (about 1.3 mg/L) is about 271% higher than the state standard and 2,500% higher than natural background.” Thank you Bob Knight for the correction.
This spring is part of the Ginnie Springs complex where water is being extracted for bottling at the rate of nearly 1 million gallons per day, encapsulated in single use plastic, for sale and distribution world-wide. Water extraction reduced water flow and increases algae growth.
Where are these nitrates coming from? Livestock and Farm Fertilizer get the award for loading our springs with high levels of nitrates. We have both beef and dairy cows in our area, both eat hay, the largest agricultural ‘crop’ in our area. Ginnie Springs Outdoor LLC is surrounded by hay production to feed cows.
The inconvenient truth is that our demand for beef and dairy is helping to fund the industries that contribute to the algae blooms destroying our springs. Beef and dairy farming is occurring on soils that cannot filter out nitrates. Fertilizers are needed to grow hay on sand.
How can we reduce beef and dairy farming on these sandy soils and switch to industries that pollute less? Our springs’ future depends on our ability to solve this problem.
To see the entire BMAPS Nutrient loading presentation for the Santa Fe River Basin, go to THIS LINK.
OSFR President Joanne Tremblay
joanne.tremblay@oursantaferiver.org
“Giving Our River A Voice”
