News Archive

(WWSB, MySuncoast.com / Nov. 18, 2018) Efforts to reduce red tide in Sarasota Bay are now underway.

The group “Sarasota Bay Watch” conducted its fifth clam restoration effort on Saturday new New Pass. Board members and volunteers teamed up with Gold Coast Eagle distributing to transport 3,600 pounds of clams from Pine Island. They are now resting in Sarasota Bay where they will help filter and clean the water.

Sarasota Bay Watch will release the last of 250,000 clams this fall. Plans are also in the works for more releases in 2019.
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(Anna Maria Island Sun / Nov. 13, 2018)

Fall is here even though it may not feel like it. We still have the windows and doors closed and the AC on, but the light and the cool mornings are teasing us with the promise of change. The golden lining is the coming cooler weather, the passing of the red tide and hopefully some of the season’s best fishing. When you read this, a front will have just passed through and as water temperatures drop, schools of bait should migrate inshore with pelagic species like kingfish, Spanish mackerel, false albacore, cobia and tripletail hot on their trail.
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(Anna Maria Island Sun / Nov. 6, 2018)

The ancient word and concept of Zen have been co-opted to refer to things as diverse as a nail salon and a burger bar. The term comes from (massively oversimplified) a form of Eastern Meditation that stresses mindfulness and meditation but for our purposes, we’ll use the commonly accepted definition “absorption.” How you might ask does an ancient Chinese concept apply to fishing? Let me explain.
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(Ocean Conservancy / Oct. 12, 2018)

My experiences on the ocean have defined my life. They began almost seven decades ago with fishing trips and picnics with family on the coast of North Carolina. Those were formative years and cemented my love for and appreciation of the ocean. I’ve been living on Florida’s Gulf Coast now for almost forty years. Over the years I’ve enjoyed fishing, swimming and exploring the gulf and its estuaries.

I’ve also experienced many red tide episodes, events that science tells us are naturally occurring and formed offshore in the Gulf of Mexico. Science and history document that these events are natural and fed by nutrients in the water. What is not natural in my experience is the number of occurrences, their severity and duration. Excess nutrients in our bays and rivers are thought to feed the red tide and draw it towards shore.
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(Florida Outdoor Writers / Sept. 24, 2018)

Photography / Photojournalism – Published Individual Photos, Photo Stories, Photo Essays (Sponsor: Florida Outdoor Writers Association)
1st Place – Eye to Eye – Rusty Chinnis
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(Suncoast View / July 28, 2018)

Check out Sarasota Bay Watch chairman emeritus Rusty Chinnis talking with the hosts of “Suncoast View” about how the organization got started and what it does for Sarasota Bay!
WATCH HERE

(Edible Sarasota / June 28, 2018)

Envision, if you can, a summer day lost to time when the air above the mainland, heated by the sun, rises into the atmosphere causing cool, moist air to rush in from the Gulf. That primordial sea breeze drives a lone mangrove propagule across the submerged seagrass flat to its final resting place among debris on a partially exposed flat. Holding there though cycles of rising and falling tides, it eventually sinks its roots into the surrounding substrate. Over millions of years of island building, natural detritus multiplies around the rooted mangrove, trapping other propagules that cluster together to form what would eventually become known as the Sister Keys.
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(Sarasota Herald-Tribune / May 7, 2018)

SARASOTA — Sarasota Bay Watch Inc., the area nonprofit that already introduced millions of scallop larvae into Sarasota Bay, is starting an ambitious program to release more than 175,000 southern hard shell clams into the estuary.

About 3,000 clams were placed in the New Pass area on April 20, as a test case.

The hope is to bring the species, one of which can filter almost 50 gallons of water per day, back to Sarasota Bay.

Rusty Chinnis, chairman emeritus and one of the founding members of Sarasota Bay Watch, noted that clams have a lifespan of almost 30 years.
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