Navionics - An easy way to help preserve Florida's fragile seagrass beds

Written by Mike Readling | 01 September 2009

Easy-to-use systems like Navionics' help you target fish and can help make propscars an image of the past.

At this point, it’s almost a Keys tradition.  You get up on top of one of those bridges, gaze down at the expansive seagrass flats and play the mental game of tic-tac-toe, using the prop marks across the flat as the boxes for the game. Truthfully, it’s a sad commentary on the state of seagrass beds throughout the southeast U.S., not just The Keys. Wayward boaters traveling outside of the channels – sometimes on purpose, sometimes accidentally – find themselves way too shallow on top of the fragile seagrass and continue to plow on until they fall back into the channel.

At that point, they tilt the engine up, check the lower unit and continue on to wherever their destination was before the trip through the shallows. What everybody forgets to look at is the damage that has been done to the seagrass flat as a result of that trip.

The Snook Foundation is working towards the goal of reclaiming 10% of our lost juvenile gamefish habitat in 10 years, and stopping the loss of any additional habitat. Essential habitat includes natural tidal creeks, mangrove shield and seagrass beds.

Juvenile snook, trout, redfish, and other gamefish depend of seagrass beds for growth and survival.

That six-inch wide prop scar sliced and diced the grass bed, ruining not only that swatch but, eventually, the grasses around it. Brown – or non-existent – grass fails to properly filter the water, ruining one of the most vital juvenile sea life habitats the state has left.

Besides juvenile snook, trout and other gamefish, those seagrass beds harbor homes for grass shrimp, crabs and a variety of other lower echelon food sources that keep the food cycle flowing smoothly.

There are a number of ways to avoid damaging this ecosystem. In addition to the responsibility borne by every boat operator of physically paying attention to their surroundings and properly guiding their craft, electronics can play a big role in keeping you in deep water.

Navionics representative Paul Michele: 'Besides saving grass flats, it will keep you from ripping your lower unit off.'

Navionics produces a chip that plugs into your GPS machine and displays depth readings in contours of one and two feet. The chips, which come in Gold, Platinum and Platinum Plus models, also show shallow areas with thick seagrass beds shaded in green.

Users with the Platinum Plus chip can also enable a function which will show an overlay of the area they’re in with a satellite photo that clearly shows seagrass beds, sandbars and other areas boaters want to stay clear of.

“It’s very easy to use, we call them plug and play,” said Navionics sales representative Paul Michele. “The satellite overlay shows everything in perfect detail. Besides saving grass flats, it will keep you from ripping your lower unit off.”

Many times, the boater plowing across the flats and kicking up that rooster tail of sand and grass isn’t doing it intentionally. What commonly happens is a boater will be running through an area which is unmarked by channel markers or buoys.

The Navionics chips have the buoy markers on them so you can stay in the channel, even if the buoys have been blown away or destroyed. In those areas where you have X amount of yards east and west of the channel before you get in trouble, you don’t have to worry about it if you have the chip.

Many of the channels in Everglades National Park, for example, are unmarked thanks to hurricanes destroying channel markers and uprooting buoys. That part of Florida Bay, especially, is full of hazards to any boat that gets more than a few feet out of the channel.

“The Navionics chips have the buoy markers on them so you can stay in the channel, at least where they’re supposed to be,” Michele said. “Especially in those areas where you have X amount of yards east and west of the channel before you get in trouble, you don’t have to worry about it if you have the chip.”

Navionics makes two chips that are relevant to Florida’s waters. There is chip that runs from the Georgia border, down the East Coast, through The Keys and up to Cedar Key, and a chip that completes the rest of the Florida shoreline from Cedar Key to the Florida-Alabama border.

Navionics
Electronic Marine Charts for your GPS
(http://www.navionics.com/)