FREE
Island Easter Egg Hunt
The Island Where Our Dogs Will Bark For Boats Free
The Island Moon The voice of The Island since 1996
Around The Island
By Dale Rankin editor@islandmoon.com Regular readers will notice a change in our front page layout this week. It isn’t just change for change’s sake but an attempt to get more news and photos on the front page. We are increasing the number of pages we print to keep up with all the things going on Around The Island, and we are heading into the part of the Island calendar when the number of copies we print also increases. So bear with us and let us know what you think.
Egg Hunt an Enormous Success
Weekly April 24, 2014 Year 17, Issue 523
Inside the Moon...
Local Park Packed With Family Fun
There’s nothing but good news on our little sandbar this week. It’s the big spring beach cleanup on Saturday and weather should be good and flotsam and jetsam supply well stocked. Time to hit the sand.
Fish Stories A4
Island booms
Some information is finally starting to trickle in as to the source of the loud BOOMS residents have been reporting on The Island for the past several months. There is nothing definitive we can report just yet, but some self-culpatory evidence has found it’s way onto the Internet that indicates there is a reason why the BOOMS are louder on the south end of The Island; it is because the part of The Island which lies south of the No Gas Beyond This Point Sign is closest to the ad hoc shooting range that has developed on the land owned by the Texas General Land Office just north of the National Seashore. Stay tuned.
Water, water everywhere
Water seems to be the topic du jour as the Corpus Christi City Council this week took the first solid step down the desalinization road and as The Island looks at transforming its parks with the use of fresh water to be found not far underfoot. In that vein we include a piece in this issue by Dr. Richard Watson explaining how the fresh water got there and how best to get at it.
When you live in the semi-arid Southwest you never have enough fresh water, but fortunately for us we’re walking around on it.
Meet the candidates
Also in the issue; a reminder that the Meet the Candidates Night is next Wednesday, April 30 at Mikel/Mays on Bob Hall Pier. Now’s your chance to let ‘em know what you are thinking. It is also a chance to register to vote in the Primary Runoff Election set for Tuesday, May 27. Early voting in that race begins on April 19. This is the first Meet the Candidates Night that Island United, the Island’s Political Action Committee has ever held so we need a good turnout.
Fourth of July Fireworks
Jerry Watkins reports that while the full amount of money to pay for the second annual Fourth of July fireworks show on The Island is not yet raised there is enough already in hand
Around continued on A3
New PINS Supervisor Comes with a Wealth of Experience
By Brent Rourk Swiftly, seven hundred and fifty hot dogs went from box to grill to wrapping station to hungry families during festivities on Saturday at Don and Sandy Billish Park. Meanwhile, children slipped down the colorful and fun slide while younger tots cautiously explored the thrills of the little tyke merry-go round and other rides. Under perfect skies the park was buzzing with activities while children waited for the 17th Annual Padre Island Easter Egg ‘Hunt’ at noon.
How it gets there and how to get it Editor’s note: In last week’s issue we outlined a plan to improve Billish Park with the use of brackish, but fresh, water located just under the surface to furnish water for a pond there which would in turn supply the water needed to rid the park of its ubiquitous sandbur population. The story produced a reservoir of questions from readers, some wanting to know how to access the water for irrigation of their yards, and others from people who wonder how it is possible to have fresh water so close to the surface on a island surrounded by salt water. Fortunately we have someone who knows the answer. Dr. Richard Watson wrote a report on the subject for the City of Port Aransas in 1998. His report was focused on Mustang Island but the facts also are salient for Padre Island as well. Here are some excerpts from that paper. By Dr. Richard Watson Groundwater in the Mustang Island aquifer, which is the sand body of Mustang Island, is a valuable resource. This aquifer is recharged only from rain falling directly on Mustang
Adopt-A-Beach Spring Beach Clean-up is Saturday This Saturday, April 26, is the Adopt-A-Beach Spring Clean-up on all of our area beaches. The clean-up program is organized statewide by the Texas General Land Office depends on volunteers and each year collects tons of trash and dangerous materials brought in by currents or left by beach goers. Individuals, couples, families, schools, churches and business organizations across the state take part.
By Dale Rankin
The North Padre Island Kiwanis Club will help organize and staff local clean-up efforts next to the Padre Balli Park Office (near Bob Hall Pier). They will also provide hot dogs and water for volunteers, who should report between 8:30 and 9:00 am. Local volunteers can also report to the Padre Island National Seashore Visitor Center.
With barely three months on the job the new Superintendent at Padre Island National Seashore is still learning the ropes.
All volunteers are reminded to wear sunscreen, shoes, sunglasses, and a hat. The locations to volunteer at local beaches are as follows:
“The first thing I have learned here is that the environment is tough on equipment,” Mark Spier said this week. “A piece of heavy equipment that would last you twenty years at a park in Colorado may not last five years in this environment. Everything just rusts away”
North Padre Island Check-in: Padre Balli Park Office, 15820 Park Rd. 22
Spier’s 36 years with the National Park Service has taken him and his wife and daughters to
PINS continued on A7
Contact: Jim Needham—Surfrider Foundation, 361-825-2708 or Todd Dwyer, 361-853-9877, Gladys Choyke, 361-816-1243 Mustang Island State Park Check-in: Park Headquarters Parking Lot, 17047 State
Cleanup continued on A3
Bahamas Columbus Trail A6
Easter continued on A7
Fresh Water Under The Island
By Brent Rourk
PINS Superintendent Mark Spier
From Empty Park to Grand Festival Just a day earlier on Friday afternoon the park was virtually empty except for a few invading shore birds. Within 20 hours white tents, rides, the smell of grilled dogs, a patient Easter Bunny, painted faces, and fields of eggs filled the park, inviting families and children hoping to have fun and collect some valuable eggs at the egg hunt. Together the Padre Island Kiwanis Club and Keller Williams
Cinco de Mayo A9
Festival of Flowers A17 Island and by surface runoff from that rain. The aquifer has a maximum thickness of between 75-150 feet. It is thickest in the vicinity of the dune line, and thins to almost nothing at the boundary with Corpus Christi Bay. Water quality in wells within 1500 to 2000 feet of the Gulf beach should be good, while salinity will increase and quality decrease closer to the bay, and near channels such as channels at Island Moorings and the ship channel.
Water continued on A8
Live Music A18
A little Island history
First Attempt at the Land Cut Fails
Editor’s note: This is the latest in a series taken verbatim from a 1948 issue of Texas Game and Fish Magazine about a journey made in 1928 to explore the area around what is now the Land Cut south of Baffin Bay. The trekkers were armed with a map which showed the land bridge which blocked the lower third of the Laguna Madre to be but five miles long when in fact it was twenty. They are now five days into what was supposed to be a one-day trip. They lost their boat, food, water and guides and were finally rescued by a vaquero from the Kenedy Ranch. The story was sent to us by Islander Richard Watson. By J.G. Burr Meanwhile, the courteous Captain (John Kenedy) had us driven to the station where we boarded a train for Raymondville. From there, on the following morning, we were motored to Redfish Bay where the State boat was waiting, with which we were to complete our trip to Port Isabel. On the first day out as we traveled along I had taken five small vials of salt water
samples as far down as Baffin Bay. These I had kept in my pockets as I traversed the burning waste, and on the trip through the lower Laguna I collected other samples. These, when tested for chloride, gave a fairly complete picture of the saline condition of the Laguna about which there had been much complaint.
Pass at Murdoch Landing As remarked earlier in this narration there had been an insistent clamor for a pass through the island to reduce the salinity of the Laguna
History continued on A6