USF Students Use TBEP Mini-Grant to Enhance Bayboro Harbor Clean-Up

The Student Environmental Awareness Society at USF St. Petersburg recently received a $3,500 Bay Mini-Grant from the Tampa Bay Estuary Program for the installation and maintenance of a 75-foot watergoat that will help keep trash and pollutants from the city out of Tampa Bay. The new watergoat was installed by New Earth Industries, Inc. on Thursday, Feb. 4 along the northern edge of Bayboro Harbor where a city run-off pipe flows water into the bay.

"We call it a watergoat because goats eat anything," said SEAS president Stephanie Lawler. "It's a system of buoys almost like what you would see in a pool. Underneath there is a netting system that is lined with a series of different weights."

Lawler led a small dedication on Thursday, Feb. 4 as the new watergoat was getting installed. New Earth Industries installed a watergoat at Booker Creek, which also feeds into Bayboro Harbor, that students have been maintaining for more than a year. Student volunteers have...