American Rivers Most Endangered Rivers for 2009

[FiveWeight]

From looking at the "What is your age poll" I'm thinking a lot of you'ns will recall the TV add with the Indian Chief along side of the road with a tear running down his cheek, with a car driving past him throwing trash out of the window.?. Yes, I know I'm going back some years here. Now please don't misunderstand what I'm getting at here..... I really like the head lines that Dave Kile throws at us on this site. Good stuff, no doubt. But it just seem s like all you ever hear is how bad this water is or how bad that water is. Yes, we still have clean water issues. But this country has cleaned up it's act by leaps and bounds in the last 25-30 plus years. You very rarely ever hear about the water that was so bad you could just about walk across it or you could light it on fire and is now a viable fishery again. As I've stated before, yes be the best steward of mother earth that you can be. But you can't go back to Little House on the Prairie. There are times I think I could live that way but die'n of small pox don't do much for me either. There is a good side to most things but you hardly ever hear about them.

 

[JoelD]

Wasn't that a Mutual of Omaha commercial?

...and speaking of rivers that can be lit on fire... i live in Akron, OH so the Cuyahoga River runs through my area and it WAS on fire once in the seventies. It also runs by my office so i fish it on my lunch break from time to time. Chock full of smallies and also Pike, from what i hear. I would say it's whole lot cleaner than it once was... for the most part. The river downstream of Akron all the up to the mouth in Cleveland still leaves a bit to be desired as its downstream of a VERY outdated Akron sewage treatment plant that overflows during really heavy storms. Luckily my office is upstream of that area...