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Fish, wildlife return to St. Sebastian River after 3 years of dredging - TC Palm Page 1 of 4 <br />Fish, wildlife return to St. <br />Sebastian River after 3 years <br />of dredging' <br />BY: Tyler Treadway <br />POSTED: 4:34 PM, Nov 12, 2014 <br />TAG: health Utopic/health) I indian river county Utopic/indian+river+county) I indian river lagoon <br />(/topic/indian+river+lagoon) <br />SEBASTIAN — Tarpon, manatees and dolphins in the water; ospreys, cormorants <br />and bald eagles in the sky above. <br />As the River King tour boat's first mate, Scott Smart sees them practically every day <br />as he cruises the St. Sebastian River. <br />"Once the sea grass came back, that brought in the manatees and bait fish; and the <br />bait fish brought back the bigger fish and the dolphins," Smart said. "And the big fish <br />, brought the ospreys and eagles." <br />Smart-attributedthe wide array of wildlife to a dredgrg project that°removed about <br />million cubic yards of muck fromthe river bed=from June ?o66.to August 2009. That <br />amount would cover the 625 -acre Sebastian Municipal Airport in nearly 2 feet of <br />muck. <br />"It's -all becatise the.water_quality is better," said Smart, who remembered dodging all <br />the pipes, barges and other equipment during the dredging. "All that sediment. on the <br />bottom was keeping the. sea grass from growing. Once that was lifted off, there a- <br />vast improvement.... I noticed a big change, and it didn't take long after they stopped <br />dredging." <br />Zz9-Z <br />http://www.tepalm.com/franchise/indian-river-lagoon/flsh-wildlife-return-to-st-sebastian-... 11/13/2014 <br />