So glad to find two queen conches while snorkeling this weekend in the Indian River Lagoon. It's a sign of good health! Our poor lagoon. It's healthy now, but we're just entering the rainy season. When there's too much water in Lake Okeechobee, they'll start dumping it into the Caloosahatchee (on the west) and St. Lucie (on the east) rivers. The Lake O water is fresh water, which lowers the salinity of the IRL, the most biodiverse estuary in North America, and is not hospitable to local wildlife. And it's also polluted. It's wonderful to see healthy queen conches, but they won't be here for long if they start dumping out of Lake O. We want the Lake O waters to flow south out of the lake to be filtered through the Everglades again, like they originally did. And we also want agricultural land north of the lake to stop polluting the lake waters. It's not too much to ask. It's the way nature designed it.
