Frankie2Socks gets activated by water flow problems

 Greetings from Frankie2Socks.

It is late January 2024 and the Umfolozi estuary and the St. Lucia estuary  mouth are both still open to the sea and influenced by tidal actions.

The Umfolozi River has a net out-flow of water from the land into the ocean. The St. Lucia estuary mouth, on the other hand has other water flow issues that need to be understood and managed to minimize any future silt deposits, and ensure that these silt deposits from the Umfolozi River, drop out into the Umfolozi / Monzi flats and not into  the St. Lucia estuary or lake St. Lucia basin, which includes False Bay, Mkhuze Swamps, Catalina Bay, Makatan area, Charters Creek, Fannies Island, Bird Island, lane island, 

This is the ideal situation if we have water management rights within the Umfolozi River flow zone from rain to ocean.   But we have what we have and that is not managed in any way. There are no sediment traps, managed or unmanaged within the flow zones and catchment areas of both the white and black Umfolozi Rivers and the combined flow further to the ocean .

What to do and who to discuss this with. ????

Please leave a comment and start a conversation about the health of lake St.ucia and the St. Lucia esturine systems.

#Frankie2Socks

#4u2fish 4u2fish.blogspot.com 

Umfolozi silt closes intertidal water flow channels

 It is already spring in 2023,  and the St. Lucia Estuary has been open to the ocean since 14 April 2022. The heavy rains is March / April 2022  changed many things here in the Greater St. Lucia wetlands park region. Many pans filled up, and overflowed into the river systems that feed lake St. Lucia  .

the Umfolozi rivers both came down in serious floods, bringing tremendous silt toads and dropping thousands of  millions of tonnes silt  in places where it is now causing problems.  The farmers on the Umfolozi flats them selves have been complaining about this for a number of years, basically since late 2002.  Remember that the IWPA or iSimangaliso Wetland Park  Authority  closed the St. Lucia Estuary Mouth on instructions from the minister of Environmental Affairs following the Jolly Rubino shipping incident. The Jolly Rubino had some nasty chemicals on board, which the authorities were worried about. The water flow issues would have allowed these nasty chemicals to enter the St. Lucia estuary systems, so to prevent this they mechanically closed the St. Lucia Estuary mouth, and then kept this mouth closed until it was mechanically breached in Jan 2021.  

the mouth stayed open until early June 2021 when it closed naturally. the only other time the mouth was open was for a very sjhort period in 2007, when the mouth breached from the ocaen side following a cyclone out to sea. this cyclone GUMEDE did not bring any rain to us, but did bring rather large surf.

WE do need to put things into context a little bit. The St. Lucia estuary system is a rather complex one where 5 different rivers feed the marine esturine systems and semi tidal lake systems.  the biggest is the Umfolozi, which the IWPA claims to be 60 % of the total fresh water inflow . see the video below.

 

 The Daily Maverick published a very misleading article found here where they say that the 

 

  breached naturally with the last floods in March April 2022.

tourism activities marketing with Frankie2Socks

 online marketing is a very complicated business, with many strange and highly effective tactics available to those marketers who understand #SEMANTIC MARKETING and related link-sharing tactics that connect your different online offerings together.

I do not like wearing shoes and socks, often going barefoot in town and when out and about. this gets me some very strange looks, which get even stranger when I do wear shoes and socks, coz I wear odd Socks. this has led to some local folks calling me Frankie two Socks.  For branding purposes, I have used the word /term Frankie2Socks as a personal brand, and some folks have picked this up and run with it.

A search for "frankie2socks" currently (September 2022) gets you quite a few results. I have just recently joined an activities marketing campaign with https://www.hejju.com/ and they set up my pages at  https://frankie2socks.hejju.com/  which should soon be found when looking for my brand  (Frankie2Socks)

My email addy is frankie2socks@info4u.co.za  and I will soon be posting to a subdomain of my website www.info4u.co.za at frankie2socks.info4u.co.za 

in the meantime, enjoy, take care and use a search engine to find the information that you need...

Silt from the Umfolozi River is a problem !!

Greetings to all who read here. 

My name is Frankie2Socks and I need your support in our efforts to restore functionality to the St. Lucia estuary and lake systems within and adjacent to the iSimangaliso Wetland Park world heritage site in the Umkhanyakude district municipality of KZN South Africa. 

 The main problem in returning our wetlands and related waterways to functional status is the vast volumes of silt that has dropped out of the Umfolozi River flood waters over the years that the St. Lucia estuary and the Umfolozi River mouth were treated as a single combined unit. 

 In the post-GEF 2017 PROJECT era an exceptionally large volume of the sediment in the Umfolozi River flood waters was thus deposited at the northern edges of the narrows just South of Makakatana Bay Lodge, closing the intertidal water flow path, which are the fish migratory routes between the Indian Ocean and their semi freshwater breeding grounds.

This closure of the intertidal flow channels between the ocean and the marine fish breeding grounds needs to be addressed. 

This sediment / silt from the Umfolozi River now needs to be mechanically removed and placed outside of the intertidal water zones of the St. Lucia lake and Estuary systems. When asking around about the true volumes of Umfolozi River silt and sediment that went under the bridge on the N2, just South of Mtubatba I discovered that nobody appears to be measuring the sediment loads of the Umfolozi River flood waters. The river sediment is a really nasty issue. The Umfolozi River sediment, silt and flood debris must all end up somewhere. 

During the periods when the two systems were actively connected, large quantities of sediment and flood water debris ended up flowing into the Lake St. Lucia basin through the St. Lucia narrows. 

 The St. Lucia narrows has been closed out and silted up many times over the existence of the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands and surrounding rural areas. There is ample evidence of these past floods when scientists take a deep look. This time it is a bit different. The issues associated with global warming and changing weather patterns need to be put into perspective. 

Poorly managed agricultural practices and large-scale soil erosion due to landscape changes are prevalent and then there are the natural changes in animal migration in, and outside our many parks as well as human development and expanding rural populations. 

 There are truly many varied issues that have contributed to the extremely high sediment and and silt loads of the Umfolozi River flood waters. That being said, Just how much silt has come down the Umfolozi River ? 

To the best of my knowledge nobody has been keeping records of these issues. There is thus a problem in explaining how much sediment has been deposited within the greater St. Lucia wetlands region, including

•  the UMfolozi Flats, 
• the Sokulu farm lands and the 
• Umzundze swamplands. 

 Unfortunately, this silt and sediment has not been evenly distributed over the area, but has dropped out at key focal points where the water flows down for any reason. Within the mfolozi flats there are a number of such sediment deposit points, where some have caused major water flow changes, resulting in changed water flow paths and other nasty long-term changes to the general landscape. 

This has meant that sediment has reached new areas and caused new problems for farmers, and in some cases folks houses are still underwater in  September 2022. These silt deposits within the southern sections of the park from Mapelane to River View are scattered accross the landscape. 

In the Sokulu area farmers are still flooded out coz of the vast number of blockages in the Umsundze River flow path. 

 In the central St. Lucia areas from the mouth, moving north, these silt deposits are kind of levelled out, and flat, but at the specific zone where the river water collides with the lake water, there is a truly troublesome silt drop out zone. 

This nasty silt dropout zone at the northern edges of the narrows is substantial. This Heavy silt dropout zone has caused a rather high dam wall that now separates the lake system from the estuary system, preventing any intertidal actions betwen Lake St. Lucia and the Indian Ocean.

 This introduced silt dam wall at the top-end of the Narrows is not the only problem here. The entire  River narrows is silted up, the mouth area of the St. Lucia estuary is silted up. Nobody can tell us just how much silt needs to be removed. The numbers are scary, coz when we did rough guesswork,  and used those estimates, the answers had an awful lot of zeros.  

We did an informal science experiment to estimate  the silt load. We filed up some two-liter cool drinkemties with raw River water. Left them in the cupboard for a few days then evaluated the volume of silt/sediment in the collected water samples. The results were rather scary, coz we discovered that each single liter of water contained more than two hundred and 50 ml of sediment. Previous tests during high flood levels in the early stages measured more than half silt. 

 I am not aware of any person who measured the silt levels at the lower ends of the estuary before this water flowed into the higher ends (northern sections)  of the lake as was mentioned to / the architects of the 2017 GEF PROJECT.  the IWPA can not say that they did not know of the very serious potential threat, which became a reality that we are now living with. this silt is in place and causing problems.

 The scientific team that drove the 2017 GEF PROJECT were warned of the rather substantial sediment loads of the Umfolozi River flood waters, but chose to ignore this coz it suited their crooked agenda. This scientific team needs to be held accountable for their arrogance and deliberate exclusion of the silt issue. The silt from the Umfolozi River flood waters now needs to be mechanically removed.

 This is not going to be cheap. The longer we wait, the harder this silt will become, as bentonite does its job of binding the silt and turning it to clay. There is evidence of this action at the current mouth to the St. Lucia estuary. The clay n the estuary mouth zone is rather problematic and restricts the water flow paths which should contain sand flats, but is currently mudflats. We need some serious government intervention. 

What to do ? 

How to organize things ?

 Please leave suggestions in the comments. Frankie2Socks for the 4u2fish campaign.

My current mental state and sourcing funding.

Greetings to all who read here.

It is Tuesday 12 July 2022 and nobody is doing any thing about the massive silt blockages in the Umfolozi flats as well as lake St. Lucia and the St. Lucia estuary systems. This is currently an #EnvironmentalDisaster  of note.

The fish breeding grounds within the St. Lucia estuary system in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park world heritage site are now not available to many different marine fish species, and the natural biomass generated within the St. Lucia lake and estuary systems is no longer available as a food source for the coastal marine ecosystems along our coastline.

This is a big problem, and I am having a mental break down coz my attempts to have this problem addressed have failed. 

 The 4u2fish campaign needs your help in many different ways. Especially your moral support and your tongue touching other people's ears, so that more folks can talk about the very serious and rather nasty knock on impacts of the 2017 GEF PROJECT that connected the Umfolozi River to the northern sections of the lake, bypassing the natural filter systems of the Umfolozi flats and other connected flood zones that create the Umzunduze overflow tributary which joins the Umfolozi again near Mapelane.

There seems to be many different informal  groups and formal organisations doing things, but they are not talking much, and the public does not see any actions being taken. The folks at the northern sections of the lake are currently flooded out and the lake is truly excessively full, with a major silt deposits at the northern sections of the narrows being the problem, and locking the fresh water from the Umfolozi river into the lake system.

Lots of arguments here, but who discusses the silt problem

The natural renewable resources  like fish, crabs, prawns and others are no longer present in the St. Lucia lake systems due to the massive volumes of silt deposited by the Umfolozi River at a single location where the narrows meets the lake waters.

  During the time that the estuary waters were high, the reeds grew well and ensured better silt retention at the northern sections of the lake. This natural phenomenon ensured that a rather substantial wall of silt clogged up the water flow paths between the ocean and our marine fish breeding grounds commonly called lake St. Lucia.

The 4u2fish campaign needs your support to fix the problems associated with poor esturine management by the state and it's duly appointed representative entities. The iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority or IWPA is the custodian as per the world heritage convention act and associated legislation.

 I will be meeting wit hthe IWPA to discuss a way forward, and what needs to be done,  during the next few days.Once that meeting has taken place I will write more here.

Many thanx for reading our posts her on the interwebs. Please share further

#Frankie2Socks for the 4u2fsh campaign the 4u2fsh campaign.

The St. Lucia Estuary is closing fast.

 Lake St. Lucia and the St. Lucia estuary systems are in real serious trouble. The 2017  GGEF Project has had many rather nasty knock on impacts. The major issues is that the iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority appointed scientific team which was in place to manage the St. Lucia estuary and lake systems failed to consider the rather large silt volumes that come along for the ride when the Umfolozi river floods.

 fresh water where there should be mixed marine  water

 

These scientific teams were well aware that the Umfolozi River carries rather large silt loads, as this was well discussed in past estuary management plans.  these highly educated folks, all with degrees and other high level education certification, chose to ignore the silt load within the Umfolozi river when it comes down in flood.

these scientific experts need to please explain... but we live in South Africa so ... ? what can be done ? 

The 2016 / 2017 GEF project connected the Umfolozi River to the St. Lucia lake systems, by passing the Umfolozi flats and Mzunduzi flood zone silt traps. This was achieved by lowering the Umfolozi river inflow, ensuring that the flood waters did not slow down and drop out the major silt load in the southern and eastern flood plains of the Umfolozi  River.

The end result is that the SILT WENT INTO LAKE ST.  LUCIA and dropped out at a most inconvenient  location. This silt dropped out at the same physical location with each flood event after the 2017 GEF project implementation this silt dropped out at the spot where the lake system joins the estuary tidal flow channel.. This problematic silt now acts as a rather nasty blockage within the estuary water-flow patterns, and denies access to tidal influences, ensuring that many marine fish species no longer have access to their breeding and nursery grounds.  The long term impact f this is a rather serious decline in fish numbers all along the South African coastline.

The nasty silt blockage at the base end of the St. Lucia Narrows, where the lake ends and the tidal flow channel starts, reached incredible heights  and is now about 2.5 meters (or more) above the spring tide high water level. I tried searching the iSimangaliso wetland Park Authority website at www.isimangaliso.com but this website is purely about tourism stuff and thus very UN-helpful. 

there is apparently no entity tasked with measuring the silt levels and related water flow patterns. 

we need some help to put true and nasty pressure on the minister to cometo the party and repair the damages created by the horrid and nasty mismanagement which has taken place under her watch. this should not be a SUPPRISE, cos there has been plenty of discussion about the JANUARY 2021 breaching of the St. Lucia estuary mouth by the St. Lucia community.  Unfortuntely the minister is not doing anything about the #FISHBREEDING and nursery grounds within the ST. Lucia lake and estuary systems.

2hat to do ?  comment and tell us your views.

#Frankie2Socks for the #4u2fish campaign.

read more at 4u2fish.blogspot.com 

 

Environmental activism is a strange thing ..

 Environmental activism is a strange thing, and creeps up on you. You usually only become involved in any Environmental activism project when the smelly stuff has already collided with the wind making machine. 

I have been skirting around the edges of the Environmental issues associated with the St. Lucia estuary systems, and now feel the need to step into the fight and push the issues of lost fishing rights and related economic impacts. 

These said fishing rights are divided into groups, where indigenous rights,  international tourism rights and domestic tourism rights each need to be looked at separately as well as collectively.

Today I will focus on some of the indigenous fishing rights, and associated matters.  I have discussed these before, in many different blogs, and one of the more important posts is found here   

http://frankie2socks.blogspot.com/2021/06/section-24-of-constitution-and.html?m=1

Section 24 of our national constitution is a powerful tool for every conservationist.  It is a short and sweet section, but very powerful, and rather explicit in it's intentions.  The biggest part of any law is it's purpose and intentions. This always comes to play when one challenges the constitutionality of any issue.

The department of Forestry Fisheries and Environment appointed an independent panel of scientists to look into the issues around the opening of the St. Lucia estuary in Jan 2021 by community groups in the village of St. Lucia, which is the tourism hub for the iSimangaliso Wetland Park World Heritage site in north east KZN South Africa.

This committee is has completed  their investigations, (end March 2022) and I did meet with them in November 2021. They have a very tough job, and need to be careful of how they handle the different public perception management strategies of the various role players.  If this committee does not wake up to the fact that the iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority use extremely powerful public perception management strategies, then they are gonna be in big trouble. Other groups like the 4u2fish campaign and the Revive St Lucia campaign also use public perception management tactics to push their agendas, and counter the IWPA where appropriate. Our strategies are seen as problematic by some, coz they have had way too much of Uncle Andrews cool aid.

So we need to bring in the BIG GUNS in, and fire s few salvos, just so that the debate can start moving in our preferred direction.  This is all about making sustainable use and gaining consumption tights of the "RENEWABLE NATURAL RESOURCES" as supplied and sustained by Lake St. Lucia and the St. Lucia estuary system.

Previously big business ran a prawn fishery which harvested prawns on both the TUGELA banks and Umfolozi banks which run parallel to the KZN COASTLINE  between St. Lucia and Umhlanga Rocks. This venture failed when the IWPA closed the St. Lucia. Estuary mechanically after the Jolly Rubino incident in 2002 https://www.google.com/amp/s/mg.co.za/article/2002-09-18-jolly-rubino-starts-cracking-up/%3famp. 

The mouth opened naturally on 14 April this year (2022) after relatively high rainfall in March / April 2022, but the Umfolozi mud flows have caused problems just as the 1968 Estuary management plan discussed at great lengths. The big question was and always  is "How will one remove the silt after a major flood incident, should the St. Lucia Estuary mouth be closed and the silt flow heads north up the narrows and  into the lake system.

Well that has happened, and been happening since 2002 when the IWPA CLOSED THE MOUTH. Right now the inter-tidal actions are blocked by the silt in the system which is a above  sea level in many spots within the areas that should be inter-tidal.

What are we gonna do ,? 

What can we do ,? 

What options are left for us to take ?

It appears that we need to take legal actions against the minister of Forestry Fisheries and Environment as this person is the responsible person who signs off on the iSimangaliso Wetland park Authority Integrated Management Plan in terms of the world heritage convention act and related legislation.  The Department of Forestry Fisheries and Environment was well awear that this mud and silt issue would arise, but they told us that their scientists have better ideas, and they implemented the 2017   GEF 5 PROJECT, which connected the Umfolozi River directly to the northern sections of the lake, bypassing the natural filter systems within the Umfolozi Flats and the Umzunduzi spill over zones.

This was a very bad move where many local folks made big noise. But they were ignored on instructions from Andrew Zaloumis,. Who was the CEO of the iSimangaliso Wetland Park at the time. In my mind this was a crime against nature, and we can see the results directly today. The water levels at Sunset Jetty reveal the large volumes of silt and mud that have settled in the Southern sections of the narrows, as the levels have not dropped significantly. This channel needs mechanical help to wash out the silt and mud deposits.

The water is not flowing out the lakes northern sections fast enough to scour out the silt and mud deposits. We need serious government interventions and a large scale dredging plan, as well as water cannons to blast the silt free so that it may flow when the tide runs out and remove some silt after each night tide.

Read more about the St. Lucia estuary management issues here

What to do ? How can we force the issue?

Leave your thoughts in the comments and let's see what can be done.

Frankie2Socks

#4u2Fish. #Frankie2Socks #ReviveStLucia 

Section 24 of the constitution and renewable natural resources.

 Greetings and thanx for reading here.

In my last post I said I would discuss section 24 of the constitution, so here we are.... 

Section 24 of the South African Constitution covers our Environmental rights. Section 24 is in  chapter 2, the bill of rights. This section covers both natural folks rights as well as juristic folks rights.

Quote section 24 of the South African  Constitution

 Environment (section 24)

Everyone has the right ­

to an environment that is not harmful to their health or well-being; and

to have the environment protected, for the benefit of present and future generations, through reasonable legislative and other measures that ­

prevent pollution and ecological degradation;

promote conservation; and

secure ecologically sustainable development and use of natural resources while promoting justifiable economic and social development. 

END QUOTE

There are some serious economic rights, social rights and other rights  that come along as Ryders which are sometimes not that obvious, but that does  mean that they should be ignored but rather that these are special cases that need extra vigilance from the holders of these rights.

In our case here in the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands park and surrounding areas, the economic, social and  Environmental rights are very entertained, and #Section24 of the South African Constitution caters for all these rights, and a few other hidden rights which we will be discussing in more detail within the social media environment within the coming weeks as we slowly start to dismantle the Andrew Zaloumis management erra public perception management STRATEGIES, where the use of natural renewable resources were seen as property of the IWPA and not for public consumption or public utalisaion. 

   if we take a closer look at section 24 in the South African Constitution,  then we may read chapter 2, section 24 (b) iii as "Every one has the right to have the environment protected, for benefit of present and future generations through reasonable legislative measures that secure ecological sustainable development and the use of natural resources while promoting justifiable economic and social development 

Now the key here is the the aim, which  is to ensure that local communities have the right to make use of natural resources, while justifiable social development and economic issues are also included as special Ryders.

Here at Nibela these economic and social rights have been violated and erroded by the environmental policies and practices of the Andrew Zaloumis estuary management STRATEGIES as approved and implemented by the ministers instructions through the actions of the IWPA or iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority.

So our beef about section 24 of the South African Constitution is with the minister of environmental affairs, coz this is an environmental issue, where bad faith and poor oversight has been applied.

Basically our economic rights as associated with the trade of the natural renewable resources of lake St Lucia and the St Lucia Estuary systems have been erroded past the point of sustainability, as a result of the  collapse of the biodiversity within the St. Lucia estuary and lake systems. 

This collapse of the natural renewable resources within the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands Park is as a direct result of the poor / bad estuary management strategies of the Andrew Zaloumis management team during their reign of terror as the IWPA MANAGEMENT TEAM 

The current managent team at the iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority have rather different views than the past (Andrew Zaloumis) management team at the IWPA. Their attempts to fix the issues around community benificiation are not going un-noticed, but they are very slow, and also rather subtle and in the background.  These attempts to restore community access rights are not very  public, and that needs to change. 

Our collective rights in terms of section 24 of the South African Constitution need to be investigated, and we as citizens of South Need to be vigilant when it comes to economic rights associated with harvesting of natural renewable resources

This is a complicated matter, which is headed for the constitutional court in the not to distant future.

Please comment and share further.

Regards  #Frankie2Socks

 

St. Lucia estuary is closed again.

 Greetings and THANX for reading here. I have had reports that the St. Lucia estuary mouth, which opened on 6 January 2021 closed again with the storm that we had as a cold front passed us in early June 2021.

Sunrise over eastern shores of lake St. Lucia, taken on the eastern cliffs of Nibela Peninsula 

The water levels at Mpilo Einde on the Nibela Peninsula are currently rather high. The issue appears to be the reed growth and silt deposits in the narrows and the delta around Broadies Crossing. The heavy reed growth and DELTA type waterflow channels here causese  water from the Umfolozi to slow down and drop it's silt load where it will cause the most long-term problems.

The fact that the mouth at St. Lucia is closed again is not a positive sign for things to come. Remember the 2017 Rehabilitation project undertaken by the Andrew Zaloumis management strategy, well it is my opinion that this strategy has caused serious damage to the biodiversity within the St. Lucia lake and estuary systems. It has also connected the main stream of the Umfolozi River directly to the St. Lucia lake systems, without first flowing into the Umfolozi floodplains to drop off the the larger silt particles as the water flow spreads out into both the Monzi flat lands and the greater Umfolozi flood plains. 

This means that the greater portion of the Umfolozi River silt load is now being deposited within the St. Lucia lake and estuary systems. This silt has been building up with each serious rain within the Umfolozi River catchment zones. When the flood waters subside, the silt remains. From 2017 till the St. Lucia Estuary mouth was breached artificially on 6 January 2021 these many tiny, small and mild flooding episodes within the Umfolozi catchment zones has each contributed just a little to the raising of the estuary and lake bottoms.

In some areas like the Sokulu farming zone within the base end of the Umfolozi flood plains, these large scale silt deposits have generated reed blockages which have grown to form water flow barriers, retaining high water levels at specific naturally occurring constrictions, causing long-term back-flooding.

This long-term back-flooding is a serious problem in the Sokulu farming zone, Which will only be solved by mechanical intervention, or dredging of the main water flow channels to below sea level.  This will be a mamoth task, just as dredging of the water flow channels between the northern sections of the lake and the actual estuary mouth, will also be a rather large task.

These are all, in my opinion logical issues, that can be easily seen, and understood by the average person. However past public perception management STRATEGIES of the IWPA (iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority) has laid a foundation of confusion around waterflow, mudflow and intertidal actions.

The base end of the Umfolozi flood plains in the Sukulu area used to be tidal once upon a time.. Long ago. Silt deposits from the Umfolozi River have taken their toll and filled the area with furtile soil over many generations. Now with " GLOBAL WARMING and CHANGING WEATHER PATTERNS" we as humans need to do what we can to firstly survive, then where possible prosper and enjoy lifes many bounties.

Enjoying something does not mean destroying the available natural renewable resources, so these need to be managed in a sustainable manner, and that starts with understanding the breeding and life cycles of our natural renewable resources. The St. Lucia Estuary and lake systems used to supply abundant natural renewable resources, and many up and down our coastline enjoyed this abundance. 

The extremely poor / bad ecological management of the St. Lucia lake and estuary systems by the Andrew Zaloumis management team has ensured that these natural renewable resources within the iSimangaliso Wetland Park have been seriously compromised, and in some cases even destroyed.

We want our heritage back, and have thus taken a stand on the issues around natural renewable resources and section 24 of the South African Constitution, which some folks will not appreciate, purely because their thinking has been contaminated by public perception management from those folks who want to see high end international tourism in places where nature provides us with sustainable natural renewable resources. These tourism opperators, and their high end investors, do not want to share with the folks who are living in the areas that they want to turn into tourism wonderland.

What to do ? Which way to turn?

Leave a comment and share your views.

In my next post I will discuss #Section24 of the South African Constitution. 

#Frankie2Socks 

Waterflow problems in Lake St. Lucia and the St Lucia Estuary.

 There are currently many problems facing the St. Lucia estuary and lake systems, but in my personal opinion the silt levels caused by the closure of the St. Lucia estuary mouth are currently (May 2021 )  the biggest issue that needs to be addressed.

The St. Lucia estuary mouth was closed by the IWPA ( iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority ) in 2002 following the Jolly Rubino incident. When the #JollyRubino ran around in 2002; there  was a very distinct possibility that some chemical polution may occurred in the St. Lucia estuary, and the department of Environmental Affairs instructed the IWPA to MECHANICALY close  the St. Lucia estuary mouth as a precautionary measure.

The mouth to the St. Lucia estuary has remained closed ever since, with a 157 day respite in 2007, after cyclone Gumede unleashed huge waves and a storm surge on the KZN coastline. This heavy sea and associated storm surge breached the St. Lucia estuary from the ocean side causing massive and serious long term problems for the functionality of the St. Lucia estuary and lake systems.

The mouth of the St. Lucia estuary system has thus basically been closed to the Indian Ocean since the Jolly Rubino incident, and was MECHANICALY opened on 6 January 2021.

Lake St. Lucia is fed fresh water from 5 major sources, with the Umfolozi River being the largest, and the furthest South. The #UmfoloziRiver is also the biggest exporter of raw silt into the St. Lucia estuary and lake systems.  The  silt from these rivers has therefore been accumulating within the lake and estuary systems for the last 18 years

Since 2002 there have been many serious rains within the catchment  area of the Umfolozi River, and these rains have each added to the silt load within the St. Lucia lake and estuary systems. Both Lake St. Lucia and the St. Lucia estuary have silted up considerably due to these big rain events.

The connecting channel that connects the northern sections of lake St Lucia to the main estuary mouth at Mapelane has silted closed, there after grown over by Reed's, and is now unable to function in a normal manner, then more flooding has dropped deeper silt layers  on-top of the Reed's and truly disconnected the northern sections of the lake from the estuary mouth.

This means that the waterflow between the northern sections of the lake and the Indian Ocean is no longer viable, causing great harm to the biodiversity of the entire St. Lucia ecosystem. The fishing industry along the entire South African Coastline has been impacted in a rather negative manner by these silted up waterflow channels.

As discussed in this short YouTube clip by the IWPA,   the St. Lucia lake and estuary systems form the core breeding grounds of many marine species. With these breeding and nursery grounds out of commission, due to poor / bad management by the iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority juvanile recruitment is now a very big issue.

With minimal juvanile recruitment from other esturies our fish stocks are in steady decline. Within the St. Lucia lake system, many of these species are currently locally extinct.

We need to address these issues. 

For more info send an email to 4u2fish@info4u.co.za

More coming soon.

There is so much going on right now, that my head is spinning and I am not sure what top do.  then out of the blue, I get a direct threat to my personal well being from an unexpected corner

 remember to stop and smell the flowers...

There is this fella in St. Lucia, who for some reason thinks that I am about to chase all tourists out of town, and do something strange .... Well I know that I look at life from other angles to most folks, and that my thinking does not fit into other peoples pigeon hole mentality, where each person is treated according to where he / she is perceived to fit within society, according to what others say about you.

My personal life style came under fire from this fella, who threatened me saying that he would "send some folks after me to sort me out"   This direct  threat to my person came as a surprise, and I was not sure how to take this threat.  So I did the unexpected thing, and asked for advice from old friends who live in Cape Town, and I received a rather devious and complicated answer.  hence this post.  first issue was that I should go along to the local police station, then ensure that this threat to my personal well being be noted in the OB  (Occurrence Book)  and that I should follow that up with a post online discussing what the possible reasons for that exact threat was or is,  then go ahead and carry on with my life, but ensure that I push certain issues harder....  COZ these are stirring the pot at the parliamentary level, which is about to cause some investigations and political disturbances of a serious nature.

Should I name this person ?  please leave a comment and say why or why not....

The 4u2fish Campaign is coming along and we have a few signatures on our campaign to get high level government delegations to investigate the issues around lost economic activities and their negative impacts on Umkhanyakude district municipality, as a consequence of the mismanagement of our natural renewable resources within Lake St. Lucia and the St. Lucia Estuary Systems and surrounding water ways.

Just the other day we had a by election here in   St. Lucia village, and the politics around the management of the iSimangaliso Wetland park World heritage site was pushed into the lime light in some unexpected ways by yours truly.  The after effect of this is being felt by me directly, and a few folks in positions of power seem to have an interest in what I have to say, and how I am saying what I am saying.  Some have found my views rather favourable to their personal agenda, and others think that I am scratching where there is no itch, and need to go away.

Then there are the few folks who have been doing stuff that is not too "KOSHER"  who seem rather upset that I am asking high level government delegations to take a  #PEEPSEE at the true, on the ground impacts of attitudes and activities of them folks who are in power positions within the tourism industry of Umkhanyakude, and how their actions, non actions and policies are impacting the life styles of rural folks within and surrounding the iSimangaliso Wetland Park.

The perceived poor management of the St. Lucia estuary system by the IWPA is a  very big part of what I am saying, and this is also a hot topic in parliament during these last few days of 2019. This issue is causing reverberations in unexpected places.

The Estuary Management Plan  which should be in place as mandated by the ICMA or Integrated Coastal Management Act, along with its serious amendments and related legislations is the real issue, as the public is under the perception that nothing is going on. The St. Lucia Rate Payers association has been pressurizing the IWPA or iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority to do something about the lake and estuary management, but I am not privy to these discussions.

The threat directed at me personally by this fella could be directly related to the issues around the St. Lucia Estuary management plan, but I am not sure about that. The fact that this fella is closely connected to the St. Lucia Rate Payers association  is also a concern to me, but I do believe that this threat was not and is not condoned or appreciated by the management team of the St. Lucia Rate Payers association. I am how ever convinced that the fella in question  believes that his connection with the St. Lucia Rate Payers Association will give him some sort of immunity or legitimacy.

The 4u2fish Campaign is all about building the domestic tourism industry, and ensuring that the local residents of Umkhanyakude District Municipality get an equitable share of the tourism connected to the recreational use of our lakes, rivers, dams, pans as well as the St. Lucia estuary and the indian ocean.

Eish !!! load shedding now at 14 H 10 in the St. Lucia Library.   please leave a comment below and tell me if I should name the fella who threatened me or not .... need to publish thisd any way coz of legal issues around being threatened.

thanx for reading.. please sign our petition here https://secure.avaaz.org/en/community_petitions/Sihle_Zikalala_Premier_of_KZN_south_Africa_Support_the_4u2fish_campaign_in_our_efforts_to_restore_BIODIVERSITY_in_St_Lucia_Estuary/ 

the 4U2FISH campaign is slowly gaining momentum

The 4U2FISH campaign is in place to ensure that the domestic tourism market associated with fishing, hunting and collecting of natural renewable resources is taken seriously by the tourism bodies and businesses within Umkhanyakude District Municipality.

Fishermen and their crews have a bad rap here in St. Lucia and they are not really welcome at most tourism establishments within the village of St. Lucia. This change of attitude by the local tourism businesses did not happen in 24 hours, but was a slow process that was managed and driven, through elegant high level PUBLLIC PERCEPTION MANAGEMENT by the IWPA (iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority) in their very devious and sneaky efforts to ensure that the waters of lake St. Lucia change from a salt water estuary system to a fresh water lake system, so that dune mining may be seen as an ecologically and economically  viable option when the mining companies step into the picture.

Before our area, the old Maputuland Coast, was declared as a world heritage site in  December 1999, as an apparent ploy to prevent mining of lake St. Lucia and the St. Lucia Estuary System, fisher folks were the core base of the St. Lucia tourism industry, and were most welcome as paying guests in St. Lucia.  The St. Lucia tourism industry sustained  three caravan parks that were fully functional and full every week end.  If one wanted to visit Cape Vidal over the week end, one would need to be in the line at the gate before 1 AM in the morning, to ensure that you were one of the few allowed into the park, as the numbers were limited, and many people wanted to visit the park.

We need to remember that the area was declared as a park long before the idea of a world heritage site was thought of, and the old NPB (Natal Parks Board ) ran the park as a farm, which supplied fish, prawns and many other natural renewable resources for the folks living within Umkhanyakude district municipality.

in 1998 our beaches were busy, businesses were flourishing and tourism within Umkhanyakude was a truly big thing. The government and big business within South Africa were all excited and looking for ways to expand this impact and increase the economic impact of tourism associated with recreational beach  use.   Unfortunately there were also some folks who had other ideas, like mining.........

Domestic tourism within Umkhanyakude was a truly huge thing, and there was an awful lot of interest in the economics associated with an expanding tourism base connected  with recreational activities and the eco tourism base of our beaches and the St. Lucia estuary system.

CONSUMPTIVE TOURISM was flourishing and everybody was making money.  The home stay style tourism businesses within the coastal belt between Mbaswane and Manguzi was awash with visitors from Joburg, Pretoria, Bloemfontein, Pietersburg and other areas of the Transvaal, the Freestate and the rest of KZN.  Domestic tourism within Umkhanyakude was a big thing.

Unfortunately for us, the big mining companies wanted to, and still want to, mine the lake and surrounding sand dunes for titanium and other minerals.  For them (the mining industry ) to succeed they needed to ensure that the domestic tourism industry collapsed, and would thus be unable to challenge the mining of our non renewable resources within the rich mineral sands that have been deposited over the years within the flood plains and surrounding sand dunes of the greater St. Lucia Wetlands Park. hence the 4x4 ban which did its job and hurt domestic tourism industry, causing some 20 000 job losses

Mining is a short term financial income strategy, but tourism is a long term business model that will employ many more folks than the mining industry, and have a much wider tax  base, that will also be around for many years.  Those who want to mine our sand dunes and water ways within the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands park have understood this for a long time, but have always been looking at ways to get in, mine and leave without spending large volumes of cash on REHABILITATION like they are currently doing  in the areas just South Of Mapelane.   We need to remember that they started mining our sand dunes in 1974, just North of Richards Bay, and that this mining has ensured the growth of Richards bay into the thriving industrial port that exists in Richards Bay today.

So they have been mining our sand dunes along the east coast of KZN South of Richards bay for more than 45 years.  In this time these mining houses have made huge unthinkable volumes of cash, and their options are now running out.  We need to remember that the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands Park was declared as a WORLD HERITAGE SITE in December 1999, from within the well managed smoke screen of  public intent to prevent the mining of our beautiful tourism destinations along the then MAPUTULAND COAST.  The first thing that the new authority did was to ensure that the mouth to the St. Lucia Estuary was closed, and stayed closed.  The IWPA did not exist at that time, but ........

The Greater St. Lucia wetlands Park Authority was renamed to the iSimangaliso Wetland park in 2007, but this organisation has been pushing hard to keep the St. Lucia Estuary Mouth closed and ensure that the ocean does not connect to the lake and estuary system.  The so called REHABILITATION which the IWPA undertook in early 2017, where they connected the Umfolozi River to the St. Lucia Lake System, by passing the natural filter system of the Umfolozi Flood Plains, has ensured that the lake has silted up, and that there is no way that the estuary will be able to have a natural breach ever again.  The tremendous amount of FRESH CLAY that was compacted by the bulldozers that pushed the dredger spoil into the Indian Ocean  during this so called rehabilitation process is a real problem, as this introduced clay layer forms a PLUG that will not easily be eroded away, as sea sand would have been.


The residents of St. Lucia tried to talk about this during the public participation process but were closed down very quickly by the scientific component of the IWPA  estuary management team.  I have been saying that the IWPA is preparing the St. Lucia Estuary and lake systems for mining for some time now, as the mining technology does not allow for mining in a saline (salt water ) system, and thus the new fresh look of the lake and estuary system is good for the mining industry.

Then there are the many cases where the IWPA closed down the informal home stay / back yard camp sites within the Umhlabuyalingana and BIG 5 / Hlabisa municipalities. This happened in a very sneaky and devious manner around the same time that the 4x4 ban was introduced. This process coincided with the very big drive by the national government to close down coastal tourism businesses that did not conform to unrealistically high criteria that  they demanded. The Transkie coastal belt suffered extensive losses within their rather active tourism industry which collapsed as a result of these rather nasty closures of informal and semi formal tourism businesses.

With some hind sight and lots of digging around to try and discover where our business within Umkhanyakude disappeared to when our beaches were closed to reasonable motor vehicle traffic way back in 2001 / 2002, one can very easily join the dots and come to some rather disturbing conclusions.  The Occasional Paper 20  by KZN Tourism which discusses the losses associated with the #4x4ban, alledges that more than 20 000 folks within Umkhanyakude district municipality  lost their economic opportunities as a knock on impact of the 4x4ban, and goes on to say that more research is needed as there appear to be other mitigating circumstances which they were unable to pinpoint with the limited budget and resources at their disposal.

The fact that international tourism boomed and flourished after the area was declared a world heritage site, was expected, and if this did not materialise, then something would be very wrong.  The collapse of the domestic tourism market within Umkhanyakude district municipality on the other hand, was caused by the mismanagement of the physical environment  and related renewable resources through the actions, activities, policies and management style of the IWPA.

These  guys  (The IWPA ) have no intention of ever fixing the ecological problems  and economic impacts associated with a dysfunctional estuary 

Please comment here and leave your views and opinions

#Frankie2Socks #4u2fish

St. Lucia Estuary Management Plan and the iSimangaliso wetland Park Authority

The iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority ( IWPA ) is the  government appointed legal entity put in place in terms of the World Heritage convention Act.

The original appointee was the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands Park Authority, and the name change ( for marketing purposes) has confused many folks, allowing the IWPA to usurp a whole range of powers and functions which they should not have in the first place.

The IWPA as the legal custodians of the iSimangaliso Wetland park World Heritage Site inherited all the below listed items and many others when the Authority was renamed

• Duties 

• Obligations

• Functions

•  Rights 

•  Legal  responsibilities

 These above mentioned issues are not to be confused with normal working issues or conditions of any legal entity, and the IWPA is not a special body which is above the law as they would have you believe. The IWPA is currently acting and behaving in a very unacceptable manner, bullying the Umkhanyakude District municipality and it's Local municipalities in many strange and devious ways, making it extremely difficult to get things done within the Umkhanyakude District Municipality tourism industry and related economic spaces

The main issue for me personally is the current ( October 2019 ) situation surrounding the management of the St. Lucia estuary and surrounding waterways. The IWPA have adopted a " Let nature take its course attitude" and this is causing many true economic hardships to unravel within Umkhanyakude District Municipality.

EDIT : 2 November 2019 ----  I discovered this link to a plan which appears to be an Estuary Management Plan for the iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority here.  there are no dates, or addresses so not sure about this, but .....   They do not respond to my emails from the email addy admin@info4u.co.za   so   perhaps you can contact them and ask if this is an official plan or what is the story....

The folks on the ground who were dependent on the fish, prawns and other renewable resources supplied by the lake and surrounding waterways are in real serious economic distress. The Domestic tourism industry is about to have a total melt down, as the tourism connected to the biological functioning of the St. Lucia lake systems and associated waterways is missing from the Umkhanyakude District Municipality economic opportunity base.

The 4u2fish campaign has thus taken a legal view on these issues, and is in the process of taking legal actions against the IWPA.   It al starts with an #openLetter to the IWPA requesting elementary and basic information through the mandated public participation process meetings, as dictated in the national environmental management act , and subsurvient legislations such as the  integrated coastal management act.

What are your views .... ????

Please use the comments below to air your views.

Please share this further so that we may expand the conversation to include the relevant folks, and find a workable solution.

#Frankie2Socks for the #4u2fish Campaign

My first garric caught at Mapelane

On Teusday  10 September 2019 I took a small walk ( about 3 Km ) from St. Lucia to Mapelane and fished the bay at Mapelane itself. There were a few shad coming out, so I decided to swim one. This has a common name among fishermen called walking the dog. I was quite lucky and had a good pick up in less than five minutes, but this fish was lucky and escaped during the pick up stage.

Feeling depressed, I caught a second shad and swam that too.  Once again my bait was in the water less than five minutes before I had a second pick up.  This fish was also lucky and after about ten minutes of serious arguing it just spat my hooks out. I was now really depressed, but as I got back a holiday maker, fishing in the bay at Mapelane came up and gave me a fresh shad, and said better luck on the third attempt.  This fish was rather lively, and swam a bit deeper than the first two, but in less than five minutes I was on with the third pick up.

This fish felt a bit smaller than the second fish, but really gave me gears. This fish ran quite hard and stretched my line quite well.  This fish really gave me a good work out and had two more  good runs before it started to tire out. We argued for about ten minutes, then she started coming in little by little. I walked up the beach to give me the advantage of the stretch in the nylon, and slowly forced the fish into the wash zone of the long beaches that we currently have along the shore line here in the St. Lucia area. I loosened the drag just a small touch, coz this is the zone where most anglers snap up, as the fish gives a serious spurt of energy when the wash is receding, so one needs to be very careful.

This fish held true to all past experiences, and tried to use the wash against me, but I was ready, and the fish lost. This wash zone is always a problem for inexperienced fishermen, and many do not keep enough pressure on the line,  simply try to reel up the slack  as the waves push in.  This is a serious error, and one must simply walk or if the waves are a bit fast,  run backwards, keeping the pressure on the line, ensuring that there is no chance of slack line, as this can allow your hook to dislodge, and your fish to escape. At this stage one needs to be real careful not to put too much pressure on the fish, coz your line may snap, or the hook pull loose.

The guys fishing with braid need to be more careful  here, due to the fact that braid has zero stretch, and a snap off can occur as the fish uses the power of the receding water very efficiently. I personally do not fish with braid simply because it has no stretch.  Others enjoy the fact that there is no stretch, and that is their personal preference. The stretch of your line is the key to keeping pressure on the fish as each new wave pushes the fish closer to the beach, and you as the angler need to use the power of the wave to bring the fish up the wash zone, and understand the the fish will use this same power to get back over the lip and into deeper water.  By ensuring that you keep pressure on the fish and hold it in the wash zone as it gets shallower, robbing the fish of the advantage of deeper water as its belly touches the sand.

Do not ever let this fool you as a fish swimming on its side still has immense power, but the sand will stop the fish once the water recedes enough.  A fish on the sand is not in the bag, and very often the next wave will have your fish swimming again, and this time with much more vigour, as it understands that this is a life and death situation, so be prepared, and do not take tension off the line until somebody has got hold of your fish and is running up the beach with fish in hand.

This garric weighed in  at just over seven kilograms ( 7.4 ) and when gutted proved to be a female with eggs. I do not do the tag and release thing, as I catch fish for the pot, if not mine, then some body else will enjoy cooking and eating what I catch.

Any way enough bragging about the fish I caught, and now for a request of help to get the 4u2fish campaign some social media coverage and some positive public perception  management points. The #4u2fish campaign is all about returning consumptive tourism to the South African coast line. Our initial focus at the 4u2fish campaign will be on the Elephant Coast region, which was previously called the Maputuland Coast. Since the IWPA ( ISIMANGALISO WETLAND PARK AUTHORITY ) took over the management of the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands Park way back in December 1999 things have slowly changed for the worse with the IWPA being anti domestic tourism, and promoting international tourism at the expense of us as South Africans, causing many serious issues including the loss of more than 20 000 jobs, as a consequence of bad management decisions and related community anger.

This anger is slowly building up and the management of the IWPA just simply brush it off and carry on regardless.  The 4u2fish campaign aims to stop the IWPA in their tracks, and reverse the anti domestic tourism drive that they have been running since they stepped into the picture.  The local population of Umkhanyakude District Municipality is reliant on the passing trade associated with domestic tourism,  so bringing back consumptive tourism is a big issue, as this is basically the domestic tourism market.

Your help in talking about this and getting the topic of consumptive tourism out there in the social media will be appreciated.

Thanx for reading my blog. Please subscribe and should you have any questions contact me directly at frankie2socks@info4u.co.za or leave a comment here.

Sorry guys, but my old tablet wont publish the pic, I will get the pic published from another device just as soon as I can.   

The 4u2fish campaign is active and needs your views

Yesterday, 29 August 2019 I attended a public meeting called by the IWPA or iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority to discuss issues around concessions and concession holders problems. At first glance most of the attendees at the meeting were impressed by the IWPA delegates and the new approach of inclusivity  by the management team of the park.

That being said, the team from the IWPA were either ill informed, or they were trying to pull the wool over the publics eyes.

This public  meeting was .held in the old NPB Auditorium in the village of St. Lucia and there were many folks from Sodwana bay and other outlaying areas of the iSimangaliso Wetland Park. The thing that stuck in my throat, and caused me to have a sleepless night was the fact that we, as local residents were told that the casuarina trees surrounding the ablution facilities at the St. Lucia estuary mouth were dying, and that this was the reason for their removal.

This in my humble opinion is a blatant lie, and I am not sure if this was dis-information or mis-information. Any body that knows casuarina trees  will tell you that these trees are extremely hardy, and that there are no known  diseases which kill them off here in Zululand.  Think clearly and remember which trees the dune mining companies use within their rehabilitation process after mining.

Casuarina trees were planted by the South African government ( way back in the late 1950's early 1960's ) to change wind flow patterns and protect our sand dunes after a rather tedious and lengthy study. They did their job very well, but the new science folks deem this to be problematic, and there was a great effort from the early 2010's to remove these, as the new scientific opinion was that these trees are now causing unwanted problems.  This debate needs to be held at a future public participation process meeting, where all sides should be allowed to question the scientific data available,  personally I believe that  the removal of the casurina trees along our shoreline was an error, as this was the only mechanism that protected our beaches  and dunes from wind erosion and the influence of coastal currents at the bases of our primary dunes along the coastline between Mapelane and Kozi Bay.

These casurina trees in question were keeping the estuary open and prevented the migration of the beach into the St. Luçia  estuary mouth. The road between Ingwe beach and estuary beach is already a few meters under sand and not accessible in any shape manner or form. This is the same area that is part of the St. Lucia precinct plan, where the current board walk ( from the Ski Boat club to the beach) is about to be extended.  The fact that this sand migration is not discussed and included in the EIA ( Environmental Impact Assessment ) needs some serious attention, as the ablution blocks were apparently removed due to their perceived problem location, which is the same location that the board walk extension is supposed to be, whiçh strangely has no problems at all.

This does not make sense at all, and somebody some where is about to be in a very uncomfortable position. The space is approved for new development, but the old development has been removed due to environmental stability problems.  So is there a problem or not? Were these trees really ill? Trees do not die without cause, casurina trees are truly hardy, and can grow in rather hostile environments.

The question is thus which information is correct ?  They are mutually exclusive issues, so some explanation is needed.

We thus need an explanation of what disease or problems these trees had, and what was the issue which warranted their removal and the removal of the ablution block that they were protecting?

What do you think that we, as the 4u2fish management team, should do?

Should we ask for the EIA ( Environmental Impact Assessment ) for the so-called St. Lucia Precinct plan to be revisited, and the Environmental Practitioner who approved this development to be investigated because the SAND FLOW ISSUES for the boardwalk extension appear to be some how ignored ?  Or is there some other explanation which is being withheld from the publiç domain?

Please leave a comment and share if you think that others should get involved.

#FRANKIE2SOCKS
#4U2FISH

Biodiversity problems in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park

The current situation within the Greater St. Lucia Wetlands Park is not one that folks want to hear about,  as it is both  depressing and infuriating at the same time.  The main  issue is that the IWPA or iSimangaliso Wetland Park Authority have been mandated to manage the iSimangaliso Wetland Park  World Heritage Site, in terms of the WHCA  ( World Heritage Convention Act ) and associated legislations, but have failed to take local communities into consideration, causing many strange problems, with the largest impact being the dramatic collapse of the biodiversity within Lake St. Lucia and the St. Lucia Estuary system.

The knock on impacts of this collapsed biodiversity are quite substantial, and the negative impact on the Umkhanyakude district municipality is growing at an alarming rate as communities no longer have access to the vast renewable resources that sustained them in the past. Expanding Poaching,  excessive harvesting of wild fruits, and generally living off the land in a non sustainable manner are also part  of the impacts associated with the collapse of the biodiversity within the St. Lucia Estuary System and associated waterways within the Umkhanyakude.

The tourism losses that are directly connected to the loss of biodiversity within the St. Lucia Estuary system and surrounding rural areas is substantial, as the boating public along with their friends, family and associates are no longer visiting our region.  The passing trade associated with the boating fraternity is quite substantial, and this really needs to be addressed at 1) National level, 2) Provincial level, 3) district and local municipally level.

The 4U2FISH campaign is in place to address these issues and help government connect the dots between poor biodiversity management within the iSimangaliso Wetland park and poverty on the ground in the Umkhanyakude district municipality.  The fact that local communities are excluded from the many mandated planning procedures within the IWP is of grave concern.  Our collective rights in terms of section 24 of the   South African Constitution are quite extensive and include but are not restricted to :

1) economic rights
2) social rights
3) land access rights
4) access rights to renewable natural resources

These are very important rights that communities have lost due to the manner in which the IWPA administer their mandate to manage the first world heritage site in South Africa. There are many acts and a host of related legislations which mandate how the park should be managed, but the IWPA has acted as if their decisions are outside of the South African laws, and they are not responsible to the South African public for the economic and social devastation  that follows their actions, policies, activities and decisions.

The 4U2FISH campaign has been established to mobilise the public into taking actions to remedy the situation.  This public mobilisation has become essential because the IWPA management policies some how seem to exclude public participation processes that are mandated in terms of various acts and associated legislations with the NEMA or National Environmental Management Act being the true tool that we need to use, in conjunction with SECTION 24 of the South African Constitution as quoted below.

Quote
Environment

Everyone has the right

a. to an environment that is not harmful to their health or well-being; and

b. to have the environment protected, for the benefit of present and future generations, through reasonable legislative and other measures that

i. prevent pollution and ecological degradation;

ii. promote conservation; and

iii. secure ecologically sustainable development and use of natural resources while promoting justifiable economic and social development.

End quote....

So effectively section 24 \  b \ iii states     

Everyone has the right to have the environment protected, for the benefit of present and future generations, through reasonable legislative and other measures that secure ecologically sustainable development and use of natural resources while promoting justifiable economic and social development. 

Now the rights in the bill of rights are not exclusive to natural persons,  and JURISTIC PERSONS also have recourse in terms of these rights.  This implies that the various impacted communities which have lost economic, social and environmental rights as a consequence of the management strategies implemented by the IWPA have recourse in terms of section 24 of the South African constitution.

Please join us in the debate around this issue on our FACE BOOK PAGE

#Frankie2Socks
#4U2FISH
#RestoreStLucia
#HerstelStLucia

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SFI  Product of the week
Week 2 Jan 2018

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Fishing at Mission Rocks in the iSimangaliso Wetland Park

Fishing  at Mission Rocks and adjacent rocky  shores in the iSimangaliso  Wetland  Park  is usually quite awsome, but the wind  has been blowing  in a north east direction for about three weeks now, chasing many folks off the rocks and making fishing a bit uncomfortable.

These first three weeks in November 2017 have produced  some fish along the rocky shores between  Cape Vidal  and St. Lucia, but there  should have been plenty more. My fishing   trip with Gareth  Robertson  the weekend  (18 / 19 November 2017) was quite enjoyable, even though we were blown  into submission on Saturday 18 November, coz we had an opportunity  to do a little driving around the iSimangaliso  Wetland  Park  and we're treated to some really cool sightings of game, as well as plenty of flowers in bloom.

We got to take a walk on the dried out sand  bed of Lake Bhangazi,  and  bumped  into some guys that were  fishing for barbel in the murky waters, and had a beer with them while chatting about barbel  fishing in general.

The drive on the  Bhangazi  loop road was very relaxed and a number of cars passed us as we took our time looking at flowers in bloom and just simply  enjoying the many game sightings, with plenty of ZEBRA,   KUDU,  GNU (blue wildebeest) RHINO, and other creatures.

This loop road was very fruitful  from a game viewing  perspective and I recommend  that every visitor to the iSimangaliso  Wetland  Park  take the time and effort to experience  as many of the loop roads as their time allows.  In other words, make sure that you go into the park early, and leave just in time to get our before they close the gate.  Remember that there is a R 500.00 fine for late exit......

There are many new loop toads and a few different  hides, so perhaps a day or three maybe  better  to see all.  There is plenty to see with lots of game, and even Hyhina  and leopards if you are lucky.  As for birds, there are plenty, and some are  rather  special sightings, like saddle  billed  storks.  There are plenty of yellow billed kites, but these seem to be restricted  to the coastal  zones only, where we also saw a fish eagle and plenty of swallows.


My battery on my phone died, so I  did not get pics of everything that a I would have liked. So remember  to take a good camera,  with extra  batteries, or a charger that will work  from your  transports  electric supply.

We tried fishing again on Sunday, but once again the wind was up, the surf was a bit on the large  side, and we did not catch  as many  fish as we would have liked.  We did see quite a few fish,  that were  caught by others, where kingfish, grunters, rock  cod,  sand sharks, salmon and others  were on display to claim bragging rights.

Once again, I bobbed out, but Gareth  caught a blue spotted sand shark. I did have a few good runs, and got bitten off three times, so the fish were eating, but our luck was the wrong colour.

On the way  out of the park we were treated to my first Hyhina sighting in the park,  and this guy was rather accommodating, as  I got a few good pics of this beautiful  animal.  We got to the gate at 18 H 58 which was cutting it a bit fine, as we fished in the bay at Cape Vidal till the last  minute, leaving Vidal at 18 H 10 and stopping for a few pics  nearly  became expensive, due to the R 500.00 late  exit  fine.