How to Protect Your Boat and The Environment?

Whether you have boated for decades or have recently bought your very first ship, it is important to protect your investment, in addition to your passengers, your self and the environment that most of us enjoy. By following a few rules of the water we can perform all three. That's why Boat Trader is working on a series of posts about best boating practices. Here we will have a peek at shallow water boating tips and advice.

Shallow Water Boating: From Shoals into Seagrass And Flats

First, watch out for shallow water. Shallow waters, whether they're rocky shoals, seagrass apartments or sandbars, are everywhere we ship. If we unintentionally hit them run aground, it makes for a poor day on the water because we wait for the tide to come in and float the ship. If we brush those habitats, engines suck up sand and dirt that breaks and clogs significant parts in the engine needed to keep it cool. Hitting flats can also cause serious damage to engines ship and hulls.

"Seagrass or sand impacts may cause congestion at the water cooling stations and cause distress," says marine mechanic Jason Weaver of The Straight Line Marine. "It may also breakdown the integrity of this impeller/water pump"

Repairs for this harm can reach upwards of $200. And when these repairs aren't addressed immediately, they can break your engine beyond repair. Potential damage from hitting hard-bottom flats or rocky coral can be even more costly.

"Damage to a outboard can fluctuate from prop ($100-$400), to prop hub ($30-50), to skeg ($150-$200), to prop shaft ($300 just to straighten), to entire lower unit ($2000-$3000)," says Weaver. "The worst cast scenario is harm can travel all of the way to the motor block, which means you have to purchase a new engine"

Prop Scars: What Are They And Why Do They Really Matter?

Apart from boat harm, running over these shallow waters hurts our shallow water habitats, which are essential for our precious recreational fisheries. These habitats also trap sand and dirt suspended in the water, which retains our oceans clear. As soon as we run more than those shallow waters we kill the seagrasses, developing a scar on the cave. "These scars require four to seven years to recover, which means a tiny error on the water causes long term harm," says Dr. Ross Boucek, Bonefish & Tarpon Trust's Florida Keys Initiative Manager.

As soon as we produce enough scars, these seagrass meadows create less food for fish, and provide less areas for them to conceal, raising their risk of being consumed by sharks and other predators. Together, these scars decrease how many fish we must grab in the surrounding areas.

Strategies To Get Boating In Shallow Water

• Should you see shallow water, then do not risk it. You should either idle over it or run across it. If you begin to come in contact with the bottom, back out and run across that area.
• Use your eyes to navigate; rely on your GPS unit just as a navigational aid.
• Treat yourself to some great set of Polarized sunglasses. These glasses permit you to observe those shallow waters much easier.
• If you are drifting in an area that you're unfamiliar with, avoid driving in these areas at sunset and sunrise and at nighttime when navigational hazards are more difficult to see.

Avoiding shallow waters will save you the headache and prices of motor repair, maintain our fisheries thriving, and our waters clean.

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