Beautiful Val

Vallisneria americana, aka "tapegrass," aka "water celery," aka "Val" is a lovely vascular plant that lives its entire life beneath the water's surface in lakes, rivers, and slightly brackish estuaries.

In Florida, Val is threatened by declining water quality and (in estuaries) by fluctuating salinity levels. It can tolerate up to about 1/3 the salinity of seawater, but it dies if it gets saltier than that. Another threat to Florida Val is grazing by the huge, non-native, aquatic snail Pomacea insularum, aka the Island Apple Snail.

This year at Florida Gulf Coast University I have my first graduate student, Shannan. She's going to do a project looking at the interactions between salinity, snails, and Val. It's going to be awesome. Today we scored big when my colleague David Ceilley offered to share with us his personal stash of Val, which was growing in a cattle tank behind one of our academic buildings.

So cool.

The Bigger the Boom the Bigger the Break

I love formula windsurfing but it's kind of a boondoggle. Sailing overpowered on oversized, over-tensioned, overpriced, over-complicated gear is just asking for something to go wrong. First you hear a "Pop!" "Crunch!" or "RRrrip!" of failing carbon fiber and plastic, and then you hear a "cha-ching! cha-ching!" of cash pouring out of your bank account to replace the broken gear.

So beautiful, so powerful, so fragile.

The pop I heard yesterday was my Chinook Carbon 230-310 cm boom breaking just behind the harness lines. It happened when I was just sailing along with my 11.0 after doing some filming with my GoPro camera (see below). Fortunately, I was upwind when it happened and was able to bag out the sail and plane downwind back to the launch with just one half of the boom supporting the sail.

The rubber skin of the boom was the only thing holding the arm together.

Fixing a broken boom arm is apparently pretty tough. The part is under so much load when sailing that a less than perfect fix will just break again. I'm going to try it, though. The guys on the iwindsurf.com forum say the way to go is to epoxy a smaller diameter tube into the broken part of the boom, and then wrap many layers of carbon fiber cloth around the outside of the wound, too. For the inside tube I'll cannibalize part of the tailpiece of the same boom that I'm trying to repair. I won't be able to extend the boom as long anymore, but I'll still be able to extend it enough to fit my 11.0 with some space leftover. Best case scenario is that it holds up great, and the boom is just a little heavier than before. Worst case scenario is that it immediately breaks again and I have to pay several hundred dollars for a new boom. I'll keep y'all posted. In the meantime, the video of my windsurfing session (not including the boom break) is below. The song is heavy metal, so turn the sound off if you don't like heavy metal.


PS- Though there wasn't much wind today, my buddy and I got a surprisingly good SUP session in smoothly breaking waves at Wiggins Pass State Park in Naples. I think these waves may have been generated by the tropical storm on the other side of the Gulf of Mexico.

This quiver goes to 11

Moving from New England to Southwest Florida last year I gained year-round warm water in exchange for giving up regular strong wind and waves. I also gained a storage shed so I started accumulating windsurfing gear tailored to the light-winds and crummy waves of the Eastern Gulf of Mexico. Here's a rundown of the quiver I started with and how it has changed over the past year.

New England Wave-Centric Quiver-
Big Board: Angulo Surfa 10'4" sailable SUP with center-fin added for Rhonda
Med Board: Exocet Cross II 106
Small Board: Starboard Evo 83
Sails: 3.5, 4.2, 4.7, 5.5, 6.8, 8.0
Masts: 400 rdm, 430 rdm, 490 sdm
Booms: Aluminum small, Carbon medium

1. In August 2012 I got a huge carbon formula boom from my friend Brandon, who was ironically moving away from the Florida on the same day that I arrived. Also ironically, it was the same boom that I had given Brandon when I moved from Florida to New England in 2010. At that point I had no sails that needed the huge boom, but I figured I'd need it sooner or later.

2. In October 2012 I bought an Exocet WindSUP 11'8" longboard from Ace Performer in Ft. Myers. After one barely-planing session with my 8.0 sail on the WindSUP, I decided I needed a bigger sail to unleash the full power of the board.

3. A week after I got the WindSUP I went back to Ace Performer and got a 9.5 Ezzy Cheetah. One nice thing about the 9.5 is that it rigs on the same 490 mast that I already had for the 8.0. Also, it gave me a reason to use my huge formula boom. With the 9.5 I could get the WindSUP planing in pretty light winds, somewhere in the 10-12 knot range. However I was most often using the WindSUP for wavesailing with my 6.8 sail, which required having the footstraps in the inboard positions. Those positions are awkward when using the 9.5 in flat water, and it's a big pain to move footstraps every time you want to convert your board for a different style of sailing. Screwing and unscrewing the straps also wears out the board. So I started looking for a big shortboard that could be my dedicated ride for flat water light wind blasting. (Another reason I was looking was so that I'd have something to ride in the December "Inlet to Inlet" ocean race.)

4. The first board I auditioned for the dedicated light-wind planing role was a 2001 Starboard F135 85 cm wide formula board, which I got used for $400 from Ace Performer. It worked fine, especially after I swapped the oversized fin it came with for a just-right-sized 58 cm Finworks fin. Probably the high point for that board was when I sailed it in the Sarasota Winter Classic Regatta in February 2013.

5. I was never crazy about the low volume (~130 liters) of the F135, which I felt limited it's all-around light wind ability. So when I had the opportunity I swapped it for another vintage formula board- a Bic FV1.2 with 160 liters volume and 87.5 cm width. The Bic was a real nice board, especially in 12+ knots. It felt more like a big slalom board than a formula board, and it was real fast and comfortable reaching and on downwind runs in choppy water. The only frustrating thing was that it didn't seem to have quite enough power to get planing in the most typical SW Florida summer seabreeze strength; about 8-10 knots.

6. My quest for more light-wind planing power lead me next to Dr. Don Wagner and one of his home-built 100 cm wide formula boards. The Dr. Don board is super powerful- definitely a winner for light winds. So I went ahead and sold my Bic FV1.2. Of course, even a super wide board won't get you planing in 8-10 knots unless you supply it with lots of sail power. My 9.5 wasn't quite up to it.

7. My FINAL (I promise) light wind power play was to buy a used 11.0 Gaastra Nitro IV sail and matching 550 cm mast from Dan Weiss in Connecticut. The absurdly long and narrow package arrived via Fed Ex yesterday afternoon and was rigged and on the water at Bonita Beach by 6:30 pm. The conditions for sailing were challenging, with squally 7-17 knot winds spanning the range from not-enough-wind-to-plane to too-much-wind-to-hang-on. I also probably hadn't tuned the sail well. I.e., the boom was too high, I didn't have enough slack on my adjustable outhaul, I needed more downhaul, the mast-base was too far back, etc. Nevertheless, it was obvious that the sail had a lot of power on tap. Rhonda was swimming with her waterproof camera and took some pictures.



Anyway, here's the Southwest Florida Light-Wind-Centric Quiver-
Primary Sailable SUP: Exocet WindSUP 11'8"
Secondary Sailable SUP: Angulo Surfa 10'4"
Super Light Wind Planer Board: Don's Lab wide-tailed formula board
Med Board: Exocet Cross II 106
Small Board: Starboard Evo 83
Sails: 3.5, 4.2, 4.5, 5.5, 6.8, 8.0, 9.5, 11.0
Masts: 400 rdm, 430 rdm, 490 sdm, 550 sdm
Booms: Aluminum small, Carbon medium, Carbon huge

XD

Automeris io, the Painapillar

There are some cool plants in my yard- some leftover from earlier tenants, some feral invaders, and a few that Rhonda and I have added ourselves. In the leftover from earlier tenants category, on the south side of our shed, are some scraggly Ixora coccinea aka "jungle geranium" bushes. Ever since I moved in I've wondered why our Ixora look like crap compared to the Ixora in other people's yards. Yesterday I may have solved the mystery.

Ixora coccinea, looking like crap.

On a routine dog-defecation supervisory expedition, I noted a patch of lighter green along a bare stem of the Ixora. Upon closer inspection it was revealed as a very large, bristly, neon green caterpillar. The bush turned out to be infested with about half a dozen of the whopper insect larvae, gluttonously chowing the foliage.

Gluttonous caterpillar.

Chowed foliage.

I knew that some bristly caterpillars could make you itch if you touched them with bare hands, but I wanted to pick these ones off so I could save the bush. As a precaution, I wrapped my hand in one of the plastic grocery bags I was carrying for doggy doody duty, then I gleefully set about plucking the fat worms from the bush. About three caterpillars into the plucking I realized something was not right. My hand hurt. Badly, like it was on fire. I dropped my incomplete caterpillar harvest on the ground and ran inside to the sink, while the pain in my hand increased alarmingly. The pain was more like a burn than an itch, but there was an element of itch involved. The closest thing I can compare it to is a jellyfish sting. Scrubbing my hands with dish soap and a sponge might have helped a little, but the damage was done, and the affected spots itched, throbbed and swelled up like bad mosquito bites or mild bee stings.

Now it wasn't just about saving the bush. I wanted personal vengeance against the nasty arthropods who had dared challenge my notion of Homo sapiens dominance. I would need barbeque tongs.

As mad as I was, I couldn't quite stomach squishing the caterpillars, so I just put them in a grocery bag and threw the bag in our open-top trash can. I know, that's not really any more humane a treatment. But I doubt I'm the first person to consign some small creature to a slow death by starvation, thirst, or suffocation because he didn't have the guts to do a speedy euthanasia.

The garbage can detention treatment for offending caterpillars didn't work so well. The tenacity of the caterpillars and the easily-escapable nature of the garbage can lead to a high recidivism rate for nuisance grazers. Most were back on the bush the next day. For the re-offending larvae I used garden shears in lieu of non-lethal removal methods. This proved effective, albeit disgusting.

Since these events occurred I have learned a little more about the species of poisonous caterpillar encountered. It's Automeris io, the larval stage of a beautiful, large moth that exhibits marked sexual dimorphism. The female is camouflaged, while the male uses owl eyespot mimicry as a defense from predation. The species is not restricted to Florida. In fact, Florida is the southern end of its range, and you might find them in any temperate part of North America. So watch yourself, or you too might run afoul of the "Painapillar."

Something I ought to think about for the future is whether I should manage my garden to maintain plant biomass or to enhance animal diversity. If the latter, I ought to be nicer to the caterpillars.

Florida Summer Wind- 50 Shades of Not All Bad

Florida summer is not like normal summer. For those unfamiliar with the difference, I shall explain it...

First, let's define "normal summer" as those months of the year where the average high is between 75 - 85 Fahrenheit (24 - 29 Celsius). By this definition a normal place like New York City has summer from June through September, and by the same definition Florida has summer from November through April.

What Florida has from May through October is not summer. It's something above and beyond summer; a season of consummate heat and saturating humidity, boiling over every afternoon with thunderstorms from horizon to horizon. Indeed, the May through October period in Florida may be more properly called "the wet season" than "summer." The scientists I work with at the South Florida Water Management District actually do divide the year into Wet Season / Dry Season because there's such a strong difference in the amount of rain we get during our summer-like winter and our rainforest-like summer.

Anyway, temperature and precipitation are alright, but what really matters here at James' Blog is WIND. The winds during Florida's overheated wet season are notoriously light. Perhaps it's because there's little difference between the air temperature over the land and the ocean. Perhaps it's because no cool fronts can penetrate from the north. Perhaps it's because the thunderstorms mess everything up before a consistent wind pattern can take shape. It's probably all these factors and more.

That said, there IS some wind during Florida summer. It's most consistent in far Southeast Florida and the Florida keys, which dip into the zone of tropical Caribbean tradewinds. The rest of the Atlantic Coast of Florida also gets some easterly and southerly wind flow, but not with the strength and consistency of far southern Florida. I initially thought that the West Coast of Florida would have the least wind of all during Florida Summer since it's on the wrong side to get the tradewinds. But we actually do ok with our little seabreezes- maybe even better than some of the Atlantic side of Florida.

As evidence, I present two short (I tried to keep them under 2.5 minutes) videos of my summer windsurfing in SW Florida. I originally set the first video to "Planet of Sound" by the Pixes.

Florida Jungle SUP Ridiculousness

Where's the water?

Florida is a labyrinth of little waterways; both natural creeks and man-made drainage canals. A few are established routes for kayaks and paddleboards. For example, there is Lee County's "Great Calusa Blueway," which winds through freshwater rivers, salty lagoons, and everything in between. Rhonda and I often paddle the "Imperial River" section of the blueway, which runs through our neighborhood. The Imperial River is wide and slow enough to be easily navigable yet narrow and "jungly" enough to be pleasurably scenic at the slow speed of a SUP.

With the summer wet season now in full swing, however, some of our lazy paddleways are looking not-so-lazy, and some un-navigable trickles are looking temptingly navigable. The nameless canal across the street that takes us to the Imperial River is usually a stagnant flow of brackish water that reverses at high tide. Now, though, it's a strong, entirely freshwater river that we can only travel one way. Last week Rhonda and I parked a car at the Imperial River boat launch and "shot the rapids" of the canal to make a quick journey downstream. It was so much fun that I started scheming ways to extend the route by putting in at a more upstream locale.

I had to rule out our neighborhood canal, because it goes through a scary culvert right above our usual put-in. The next possibility I saw on Google Earth was "Leitner Creek," which I would be able to access from some abandoned property on Matheson Avenue about a mile Northeast of our house. (X out the pop-up box in the Google Maps window to get a better view.)


View Larger Map

I bicycled around to the spots where I knew the creek passed under a roadway and verified that there was room to paddle under. Then I geared up with some water, a cell phone in a waterproof bag, and my helmet camera. Rhonda dropped me off at the launch on a Monday evening.

Here's a video with some highlights of the next hour...



Long story short- despite close encounters with hobos, spiders, leeches, and manatees, I made it all the way to the Imperial River. I'll probably never do it again, but I challenge any other would-be Huckleberry Finns to try to retrace my journey. ;)

Wisconsin Family Stuff

Every summer when I was a kid we would leave Washington State for a few weeks to visit either my dad's family in South Carolina or my mom's family in Wisconsin. The routine became less regular as my sister and I grew up and moved out. Also, my parents retired to the Carolinas, which biased our family visits in that direction. The upshot is that I don't get to Wisconsin much anymore... but when I do it's extra special. This year I went over 4th of July week for a little Enge family reunion and for the traditional "Witwen Parade" near the farm that my mom grew up on.

We stayed the first few nights at a rental house on Lake Wisconsin, near the town of Sauk City / Prairie du Sac. The lake sometimes had good wind but there was nowhere to rent a windsurf. Primitive as can be.

Most days we would pick up my Grandma Dorothy from the retirement home and bring her to hang out with us. Grandma is nearly deaf now but she can play cards better than anyone in the younger generations.

The Witwen parade is one of those "slice of Americana" things that Norman Rockwell would have loved to paint. There's a procession of little floats and marches by small town civic organizations, followed by a big chicken barbeque. "The Living Flag" has apparently been a staple of the parade since its inception.

My favorite float advertised the state cow chip (dried manure) throwing contest. It was a fake cow, but they had it rigged up to dispense real cow chips onto the roadway. Nice touch.

Some of the Enges are still real farmers, like cousin Delorman's sons Tim and Greg (pictured). I should have posted this blog earlier, because now I can't remember if this was Tim or Greg. Delorman told a funny story about one of the harvesters (silos) in the background. Farmers have mostly stopped using silos, because they have discovered that it is easier to just pile the feed on the ground and shrink wrap it in giant sheets of white plastic. So Delorman's silo sat for several years with just a few tons of old feed rotting in the bottom. Then one day smoke started coming out the top. They opened the valve at the top and ran a water hose into it for a couple hours to try to drown out the fire. It seemed to work, so they went to bed. Then in the middle of the night... KABOOM! The top of the silo exploded into the air with a concussion that knocked knick knacks off shelves of farmhouses miles away. The silo lid shredded into jagged chunks of metal that perilously scattered all over the farm. Fortunately, no one was injured.

At the family reunion at Delorman's house I felt like I needed a laminated reference chart to keep track everyone and how we were all related. All I could remember for sure was that we had the same great grandparents. The picture below is my cousin Chuck who came up from Nebraska. He could have been in the living flag, too.

Wisconsin isn't all flat land and corn fields. It's actually very hilly and scenic, with a mosaic of forests, fields, lakes, and rivers, and a scattering of tall rocky outcroppings where you can view the landscape. Here I am with my folks and some cousins on the top of "Gibraltar Rock."

My Wisconsin relatives are mostly politically liberal "gentleman farmer" types, but Wisconsin has all types, including beer and gun loving hunter fisherman types. I got to see a bit of the other side of Wisconsin on this visit when we went to "Sprecher's Tavern" in Leland, Wisconsin. Junior Sprecher, who is 81 years old, still tends bar in this place, as he has for most of his life. In addition to pickled eggs and pigs feet, Junior sells guns to go along with his alcohol.