Madison, Wis. — If you eat fish — any fish — you should follow consumption advisories, according to the Wisconsin Department of Health and Human Services. Previous consumption advisories made distinctions between fresh and saltwater fish, farmed and wild, and whether the fish came from the river, a lake or a restaurant. The new advisory makes no such distinction.
The advisory comes after review of an ongoing Wisconsin study discovered high mercury levels in 20 percent of the participants. More of these people have eaten only purchased fish or a combination of purchased and sport-caught fish than have eaten only sport-caught fish.
“A lot of the people in our study eat fish purchased from restaurants or stores, and many of them are not well-informed about the need to limit consumption of some types of fish. They don't realize that mercury levels among sport-caught fish and the fish you buy in a store are similar,” said Lynda Knobeloch, principle researcher for the Wisconsin Department of Health and Human Services.
Participants who ate sport-caught fish were more likely to know about fish consumption advisories than people who only ate fish from a store or restaurant.
Large predator fish are more likely to contain higher levels of mercury.
Under the safety guidelines, pregnant women, nursing mothers, women of childbearing years and children under age 15 are advised to limit their consumption of larger game fish to once a month and panfish to once a week. Others can eat game fish once a week and unlimited amounts of smaller panfish.
It advises women of child-bearing age and children under 15 to eat no more than two meals a month of canned white tuna, tuna steaks or halibut. Others can eat two meals a month.
Mercury contamination is not a problem for Mississippi River fish along the Wisconsin stretch, but PCBs are. In Pool 9, downriver from Genoa, Wis., the advisory only advises against eating more than one meal a month of carp longer than 20 inches.
Wisconsin's fish consumption guide and advisories are available from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources web site. Top
Dakota County, Minn. — Tests of 66 private wells in rural areas of Dakota County, which borders the Mississippi River, show contaminants including the herbicide cyanazine, banned since 2002 because it causes cancer in rats.
Half of the deep bedrock wells and three quarters of the shallower sand-and-gravel wells bear traces of agricultural chemicals. Five chemicals showed up in some wells.
Dakota County still has farming areas but also has the three fastest-growing municipalities in Minnesota. The county's geology resembles that of much of the Driftless Area — loose, sandy soil and broken limestone that readily drains rainfall to groundwater.
Groundwater in turn drains to the river via springs — “carrying with it whatever seeped into the groundwater,” said Daniel Huff, watershed program director with Friends of the Mississippi River in St. Paul.
Surface pollutants in Dakota County reach groundwater in as little as a year. Some herbicide molecules break down in sun and soil, but component molecules wash into groundwater.
Where drainage is slower, such chemicals will appear much later, Huff warns. “We can anticipate whatever is happening in eastern Dakota County today will happen in other areas, with more protected aquifers, 100 or 200 years from now,” he said. “It's not only a local problem.”Top
Twin Cities — Organizers of the Friends of the Mississippi River Challenge, an annual fundraiser to be held this year August 6 and 7, expect 500 paddlers to cover 22 miles a day from the Coon Rapids Dam above Minneapolis to Grey Cloud Island below St. Paul. Canoeists and kayakers will camp overnight at Fort Snelling, in St. Paul.
Friends of the Mississippi is a nonprofit river advocacy organization based in St. Paul. Registration costs $30 per paddler. Rental canoes and kayaks are available.
Participants are asked to gather at least $200 in pledges by Aug. 5. Proceeds will support Mississippi River conservation efforts. Information is available at the Friends’ website. Top
Inver Grove Heights, Minn. — Another Mississippi River community aims to turn an abandoned rail yard into a natural area.
Inver Grove Heights’ Heritage Village Park will include access to the river.
The St. Paul suburb must first clear contaminated soil from the property and clean up years of “promiscuous dumping.” It may be three years or more before the park opens.
The National Park Service has granted funds to help, and will do an archaeological study of the area.
The city is still acquiring properties to incorporate into the park. The park is 50 acres at present and may reach 80 acres. A Mississippi River bike trail will pass through the area and link the park with nearby Hastings and South St. Paul. Top
Red Wing, Minn. — River traffic was quickly restored after a tow hit the roller gates at Lock & Dam 3 near Red Wing, in April, but the Army Corps of Engineers said the incident points to a persistent hazard.
The towboat Joe Pat Eckstein and eight barges loaded with cement collided with the dam gates April 15. No one was hurt and none of the barges sank.
The tow, bound upriver, had cleared the lock, but an outdraft current that sweeps across the upper approach to the lock during high water drove it into the dam’s roller gates.
The Corps said such an accident could cause an inadvertent drawdown of the dam’s pool. The Wisconsin side embankment is low and weak. A barge caught in the current could jam dam gates shut. Rising water could overtop and cut through the Wisconsin embankment.
Such an accidental drawdown could “close navigation, force power plant shutdowns and have adverse effects on the river environment,” according to a Corps release.
How great is the risk? “It’s pretty high,” said Daniel Wilcox, a Corps fisheries biologist and project manager for the Lock & Dam 3 navigation safety and embankments study.
This was the 12th such incident since 1968 at Lock & Dam 3, the highest of the 13 locks and dams in the Army Corps’ St. Paul District. The lock is on a bend in the river where navigation is difficult during high water.
The Corps devised a $56 million fix involving a longer guide wall, modified channel to reduce the outdraft and improved embankments. However, the federal government hasn't funded it, said Wilcox.
Two days before the accident, the Midwest Area River Coalition, or MARC 2000, a St. Louis-based organization representing the tow industry, placed Lock & Dam 3 among the top five “endangered” locks.
It said that underfunding also threatened Lock & Dam 24 at Clarksville, Mo.; 11 at Dubuque, Iowa; 19 at Keokuk, Iowa; and 27 at Granite City, Ill.
“We don't need to invent an emergency for media coverage,” said Paul C. Rohde, MARC president, in an April 13 release. “Rehabilitation work, general construction, even operation and maintenance funding below project capability has become an annual pandemic.” Top
Alton, Ill., & Oneida County, Wis. — The Mississippi may lay claim to the new record blue catfish. A 124-pounder caught at Alton on May 22 would top the old record of 121 pounds, eight ounces, held by a blue catfish caught at Lake Texoma, Texas, in 2004.
The Associated Press reported that fisherman Tim Pruitt landed the 58-inch-long fish — which was 44 inches in girth — after a 45-minute fight. He had it weighed in the presence of a conservation officer and measured by a biologist for the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. He donated the live fish to a Cabela’s outfitters store. Unfortunately, it died en route.
Pruitt was expected to submit documentation to the International Game Fish Association for certification of the catch as a world record.
For years Northern Wisconsin anglers have told tales about spotting huge, ghostly muskellunge in deep lakes in Oneida County, but nobody ever caught one — until this spring. A Department of Natural Resources crew netted a 32.7-inch, 7.9-pound albino muskie during a population survey.
The fish, which may be the first albino muskie ever caught, was marked for identification and released, according to the DNR. Top
Onalaska, Wis. — Releasing a fish right after catching it gives it a pretty good chance of survival. If that fish spends time on a stringer, or in a bucket or live well before being released, its chances aren't as good. Until recently, competitors in bass tournaments in Wisconsin had to keep and count any bass they didn't immediately release, until they reached the five-fish limit. Some claimed that Wisconsin didn't get its share of bass tournaments because of this.
This season the state will allow culling — the practice of replacing a caught fish with a bigger one — in three bass tournaments. Researchers will study the economic impact of the tournaments, attitudes about the culling rule and survival of returned fish.
The second of the study tournaments is the FLW Everstart Tour, August 3 to 6, on the Mississippi River near Onalaska. Top
St. Paul Park, Minn. — Environmentalists will appeal an April Washington County ruling in favor of the developer of a proposed riverfront project in St. Paul Park. The Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy claims that environmental review has been inadequate at the development, called Rivers Edge.
The project, meanwhile, downsized from 2,400 to 1,920 housing units in response to residents’ worries over housing density and traffic. The plan still requires annexation of part of Grey Cloud Township by the city. Township board members want to keep the land rural and preserve critical habitat along the river. (St. Paul Pioneer Press, 5-20-05)
St. Paul — The proposed West Side Flats project that raised residents’ ire for threatening to block the riverfront vista has a conditional use permit to build a five-story residential condo. Opponents may be holding their fire for an eight-story tower that's part of the three-building complex. St. Paul’s West Side neighborhood has a master plan that limits riverfront building to between four and six stories
More height battles are on the way. A $1.5 billion development for the St. Paul riverfront faces the same challenge over height restrictions. Developer Jerry Trooien of St. Paul wants to erect a 30-story hotel with retail, office and residential components overlooking the Mississippi from the city’s relatively empty West Side riverfront. Neighbors object to the prospect of obstructed views, traffic, noise and disruption of bird migration. The plan calls for more than 7 million square feet on 32 acres, including 1 million square feet of public areas, 375,000 square feet of retail and 1,122 housing units, botanical gardens, a gourmet food hall and Mythica, a 300,000-square-foot cultural center on world mythology.
Across the river, meanwhile, developers propose a 25-story residential condominium tower on the site of the former riverfront jail and county offices. The $100 million structure would be taller than the nearby city hall — and taller and narrower than developers envisioned earlier, to preserve more of the view from downtown St. Paul toward the bluffs on the city’s West Side.
Ironically, in this case the developers themselves are seeking height limits — on anybody else building nearby, reported the St. Paul Pioneer Press (5-11-05). Developers want to preserve the view from their development. Top
Lake Pepin — Pepin is a lake in trouble. All lakes age and eventually fill in, but Lake Pepin is aging too fast. At present rates Pepin will be silted up in just 100 years in its upper part and fully silted up in 340 years.
Meanwhile, fish that like clear water, such as walleyes, are giving way to those that tolerate silt, such as carp. Waterfowl, such as canvasbacks and tundra swans, that feed on clearwater plants are finding less to eat.
Thorough testing of Lake Pepin waters will begin this summer as the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (PCA) tries to identify sources of pollution and sedimentation.
Lake Pepin is a wide stretch in the Mississippi River, just downriver from Red Wing, Minn., and above the natural sediment dam created where the Chippewa River flows into the Mississippi.
By 2007 or 2008, the PCA hopes to identify point-source polluters, including municipal water treatment plants, that may be required by the federal Clean Water Act to remove more pollutants.
But nonpoint sources may be under fire as well: Cabin owners may be asked not to mow all the way to the shore, in order to leave a strip of vegetation to limit erosion. Homeowners may be asked to use less lawn fertilizer. Boaters may be asked to slow down to keep from stirring up silt and eroding banks.
About 90 percent of the sediment in the river is coming from the Minnesota River, which joins the Mississippi at St. Paul.
Pepin is “a natural sediment trap,” said Nancy Miller, a PCA spokesperson. “The water slows down when it gets there. It’s a wide part of the river. It just naturally settles out. The filling in of a lake is a natural process — just not at this rate.”
In terms of drainage area, Lake Pepin is the largest water-pollution project the Minnesota PCA has ever tackled. It’s also the first PCA project to cross state lines. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is involved as well, and a citizens’ commission will include residents of both states.
Pepin, 22 miles long and a mile to 2.5 miles wide, with an average depth of 18 feet, drains nearly 49,000 square miles — about half of Minnesota’s total land area plus a slice of Wisconsin.
The lake is safe for swimming, said PCA’s Miller, but the aesthetics may be less than thrilling “if it’s got a funny color or funny smell” from sediment and nutrients.
More about the lake and cleanup effort are at the PCA web site.
Davenport, Iowa — Visitors to Davenport’s riverfront next year will be able to sleep in a new 10-story hotel right on the riverfront. Following many months of debate and opposition, the City approved plans to move the Isle of Capri Rhythm City Casino one block upriver and add a 181-room hotel with a 513-space parking garage.
Opponents said the hotel site was in the wrong spot, taking up too much prime riverfront and possibly jeopardizing walleye-spawning habitat and disrupting a bald eagle winter feeding area. Proponents cited the financial benefits of development.
The process is not quite finished, however. It will take six months to a year to obtain all the permits, including those from the Army Corps of Engineers and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. Federal Emergency Management Agency regulations on floodway construction may come into play as well (Quad City Times 6-26-05).
Minnesota — Minnesota lawmakers are considering a bill that would loosen restrictions against off-highway vehicle (OHV) use in state forests, including forest land near the headwaters of the Mississippi River, but excluding the Richard Dorer State Forest, which borders the Mississippi River in the southeastern portion of the state. The legislation allows OHV users to ride on all trails except those explicitly posted as closed. It also eliminates funding to compensate private property owners whose lands are damaged by OHV abuse and creates funding for OHV groups to educate their users.
While legislators considered these changes, riders attending the spring convention of the All Terrain Vehicle Association of Minnesota caused severe damage to a wetland along the Mississippi River near Jacobson, Minn. Minnesota’s governor, Tim Pawlenty, rode in the event. It's unclear if he drove through the wetland, but his ATV did sustain $2,500 in damage over the weekend.
Springfield, Ill. — Governor Rod Blagojevich has proposed doubling the number of slot machines allowed at riverboat casinos in Illinois. He says the increase from the current 11,000 to 23,000 is the only gaming expansion he will agree to this year.
He hopes to use the new money from increased gaming to fund a $300 million education proposal, but this would also require a permanent riverboat tax increase. Riverboat people want the tax increase repealed in return for their support on slot machine increases. The horse-racing industry says the governor's proposal would “destroy” their business. To proceed, the governor has to face legislators from both parties that oppose any gaming expansion, overcome his own campaign pledge not to expand gaming, and satisfy special interests scrambling for opportunities across the state.
Dubuque, Iowa — Mississippi Journey, an interactive film of the National Mississippi River Museum & Aquarium, has won two national awards, including the Gold Camera Award from the International Film and Video Conference and the Bronze Medal in the History and Culture division of the American Association of Museums.
Produced by Manadnock Media, Mississippi Journey is a 15-minute “immersive experience” that uses three screens, theatrical lighting and special effects such as fog and rumbling seats. It is shown daily at the National Mississippi Museum & Aquarium in Dubuque. Top
Muscatine, Iowa — Lock and Dam 16 is offering public walking tours of the site for the first time since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Preregistration is required, no videotaping or still photos are allowed, and only U.S. citizens can take the free 2 p.m. Sunday tours, said the Army Corps of Engineers.
The lock-and-dam observation deck, also closed after the terrorist attacks, reopened in 2003, said the Muscatine Journal (5-26-05).
Lions, Tigers, BearsA rash of incidents this spring had residents wondering if they're living on the wild side.
Two black bears were euthanized after they wandered into St. Paul neighborhoods this spring. A black male bear managed to cross a six-lane freeway and a K-Mart parking lot before being tranquilized and removed.Meanwhile, in eastern Washington County, near the St. Croix River, a black bear jogged through residential neighborhoods, napped in a marsh, crossed a restaurant parking lot and explored the 3M Company corporate campus before it was finally removed by the police.
Other black bears were sighted in mid-May near Rollingstone and Minneiska, Minn., just a few miles from the Mississippi. Rollingstone resident Connie Blackburn said a black bear wandered into her yard one evening and spent most of an hour sitting at the top of a slope at the back of the yard. It occasionally ventured down toward the bird feeder, but retreated when her husband tossed twigs and small stones at the bear.
“We liked watching it, but we didn't really want it coming down to the feeder,” Blackburn said.
Word travels fast in a small town. Next morning, the sheriff called to confirm the story.
“He asked if we were sure it was a bear, and not just a human in a bear suit,” Blackburn said. The Blackburns assured him they could tell the difference.
Bears aren't the only big wildlife in the area. Blackburn said her Rollingstone neighbors have spotted mountain lions recently, too.
Mountain lion sightings are much more frequent in Iowa — even in the middle of Des Moines, where several people found themselves able to leap tall fences and perform other fear-induced feats upon sighting big cats in early June.
Ron Andrews of the Iowa Department of Natural Resources said three dead mountain lions have been discovered in Iowa recently, and other live ones have been reported. One was photographed with a motion-sensitive camera. He estimates there may be 10 mountain lions living in Iowa, half of which were probably someone’s pet at one time, according to Radio Iowa (6-2-05).
These free-roaming lions and bears caused no damage, but neighbors of The Tiger Zone, a 10-acre farm near the rivertown of Frontenac, Minn., were looking over their shoulders this spring. Four captive Siberian tigers mauled a woman who had volunteered to help care for them. The volunteer originally stepped forward to help at The Tiger Zone while the tigers’ owner served a jail sentence for violating a court order to reduce the number of big cats on his property from eight to three.
She was air-lifted to Mayo Clinic for serious wounds and blood loss, but later decided to receive rabies shots, so the animals wouldn't have to be euthanized.
The tigers were removed to a Colorado facility while the owner goes to trial on further charges. The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which issued the original permit, is considering revoking it. Investigators said the farm's fences were inadequate even to confine cattle.
Wabasha, Minn. — Tuesday is beach day for the bald eagles at the National Eagle Center, an educational organization that is home to three rehabbed bald eagles — Angel, Harriet and Columbia.
Because they have no sweat glands, eagles get very warm in summer months and, like humans, they love to play and splash in the water.
This requires loading up the kennel, a 35-pound perch and a long leash and driving a few blocks from the center to the beach.
Volunteer Joan Schnabel, M.D., described the activity as being much like any bird in a bird bath, except that with seven-foot wingspans, a lot more water gets splashed. First they wade out and duck their heads under so water rolls down their backs, then they spread their tail feathers and swish them back and forth, and then they roll from side to side, dipping their wings under the water. When they're done they climb onto the perch, spread their wings and flap until they're dry.
Getting them back onto the perch takes subterfuge sometimes, Schnabel said.
“It's like trying to get a two-year-old out of the water. When Angel sees you put the glove on and come toward her, she'll jump out farther so you have to wade in.”
Nine-year-old Harriet, a calm, mature bird that makes frequent public appearances for the center, turns frisky in the water. She has not forgotten her hunting skills, apparently. One day she dipped under and came up with a three-pound sucker.
Young Columbia rarely gets to go to the beach because she gets nervous and might hurt her wings.
The National Eagle Center is open from Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The Minnesota Historical Society has published a free, 40-page guide to 25 historic sites in Minnesota, including Fort Snelling, the Alexander Ramsey House and many others that border the Mississippi and are rich in river history. New to the guide this year is a two-page bike map to metro-area historic sites. Order the guide by calling (651) 296-6126 or (800) 657-3773.
The Wetlands Initiative (TWI) released a study that used GIS (geographic information system) technology to analyze data about 24 percent of the 100-year floodplain in Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois and Wisconsin. The study then identified 1.9 million acres of floodplain land that could be restored to function as emergency floodwater storage areas. Extrapolating to the 76 percent of floodplain land that was not analyzed, TWI estimates that 39 million acre-feet of floodwater could be held back — about the same amount that caused the 1993 flood.
The report, along with maps and summaries can be downloaded at the TWI website. A DVD of the GIS data is available for $20.
If you're traveling in northeast Iowa, check out the wineries that welcome visitors with tours and tasting rooms. The Iowa Wine and Beer Trail Promotion Board has produced a web site, brochures and maps of a wine trail through northeast Iowa that includes the Winneshiek Wildberry Winery in Winneshiek, Eagles Landing Winery in Prairie du Chien, Park Farm Winery near Dubuque, Tabor Home Vineyards in Baldwin and several others. Call for a copy of the brochure and maps (515) 242-4737, or download them from the web site. Top
Washington, D.C. — The U.S. Senate Finance Committee is considering recommendations made by the Joint Committee on Taxation to reduce conservation land tax deductions.
The changes, if made, could damage what has become an increasingly popular and important conservation tool.
Some of the recommendations would limit tax deductions to 33 percent of current fair value per donated conservation easement, if the owner does not live on the land; eliminate all deductions if the owner lives on the land; and limit the allowed deduction on land sold below market value.
Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, requested the Joint Senate and House Committee’s recommendations. According to the Chronicle of Philanthropy (6-9-05), the senator’s main agenda is to overhaul tax laws that govern charities and foundations, and to close loopholes that allow donors, trustees and nonprofit executives to use tax-exempt money for purposes that have little to do with charity.
Baton Rouge, La. — The Louisiana legislature voted down a bill to legalize slot machines on paddlewheel excursion boats, but the bill’s sponsor said he would bring it up again. The bill was filed by senator Danny Martiny on behalf of the Delta Queen Steamboat Company, which sends the American Queen and Mississippi Queen paddlewheelers upriver every summer from their base in New Orleans. Martiny said slot machines would help keep the Delta Queen Steamboat Company “fiscally viable.”
Louisiana state law currently allows dockside riverboat gambling, but prohibits gambling on the paddlewheelers while they sail on the river (The Times-Picayune 6-3-05). Top
Red Wing, Minn. — In early June, two friends were out for a lovely afternoon on the river near Hastings, Minn., when their boat engine flooded and quit. They were unable to paddle the boat to shore, and the current swept them downstream into the roller gates of Lock & Dam 3.
Doug Balsimo grabbed hold of a rope he saw dangling from the gate, just as the Sea-Doo carrying his friend was sucked down underwater through the opening in the dam. The friend, Jessica Veefenmeyer, was pulled under and pinned for a short time in the strong circular currents before bobbing to the surface.
Lock and dam personnel tossed Balsimo a ring buoy and opened the roller gate, allowing him to float through to the other side, where he was picked up by fishermen.
Neither of the two were hurt.
The fishermen said what many were probably thinking — “I just never heard of anyone surviving that type of accident.” (Red Wing Republican 6-3-05) Top
St. Paul — Medium to large runabouts and cruisers create some of the largest waves on the river, contributing to high rates of riverbank erosion in pools 2, 3 and 4 of the Mississippi River, according to a report released by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR), ”Shoreline and Water Quality Impacts from Recreational Boating on the Mississippi River.”
Researchers measured the heights and velocities of waves from different boats, and analyzed shoreline erosion patterns and water turbidity. They found a positive relationship between wave height and “sediment mobilization.”
According to the report, an estimated 82,600 cubic yards of soil erodes from banks in Pool 4 every year, which is four times the amount of sediment dredged for channel maintenance.
Similar erosion patterns are found throughout the Upper Mississippi River.
The report recommends controlling and reducing boat waves. Because state and federal agencies have no control over activities on the water surface, county and city government agencies would need to take action.
The report is available through the DNR web site.
Fountain City, Wis. — The newest vessel in the Army Corps of Engineers St. Paul District, the Goetz, got to work in June, dredging the shallows upriver from its base port of Fountain City, while engineers tested the new dredging equipment. The Thompson, the Corps’ oldest boat, which will be retired in two years, accompanied the Goetz on its first missions, acting as the floating hotel for crew members.
Both boats are about the same size — 200-plus feet long. The Goetz and Thompson were accompanied by several other boats. They caught the eye of watchful readers in Wabasha, Minn., who kindly sent photos.
According to the Corps’ Public Affairs office, the Goetz will operate as just a dredge, requiring a separate towboat for mobility and another boat to house and feed workers. It is equipped with a computer-assisted dredging system that will automate dredging speed and density, and avoid plugging the lines. Electricity for the dredging equipment comes from low-emission diesel engines that reduce fuel consumption and require less maintenance.
It's a much safer boat than the old Thompson, which was built of wood and had wooden staterooms and offices.
The Thompson is slated to become a museum near the barge harbor in Winona, Minn.
St. Paul — The drawdown of Pool 5 was scheduled to begin June 13, with water levels returning to normal by Sept. 30. The target level water level reduction is 1.5 foot. The drawdown will end Sept. 15, after which the water level will raised about 0.2 foot per day.
This is the third pool-wide drawdown on the Upper Mississippi River, conducted by the Army Corps of Engineers, in cooperation with the multi-agency Water Level Management Task Force. The purpose of the drawdown is to restore seasonal fluctuation in water levels to encourage aquatic plant growth, which is inhibited by the high water levels maintained by the lock and dam system. During and after the drawdown, the Corps will monitor the response of vegetation, fish, mussels and other wildlife.
To minimize the impact on recreational boating and improve public access Murphy's Cut by Halfmoon Landing and two locations in Belvidere Slough were dredged prior to the drawdown.
For more information about the drawdown call 1-888-291-5719 or visit the Corps' website.
A “River News” story in the May-June issue of Big River included errors about the town of Savanna, Ill. The town’s population is 3,400. The town’s largest industry is Metform and the largest retail business is Sullivan’s Foods, Inc. The cited number of bars in town years ago, when Savanna was a major rail hub that served the nearby Army depot, was probably too high.