Don't have access to a computer, but want to know what they buoys are doing? Well, I've made a nice little script to send the current buoy conditions to your cell phone. For more information, check this link.

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You are cordially invited to attend and participate in the Pura Vida world premiere film showing at the Charleston Film Festival on Saturday May 3rd at the Terrace Theater from 4 -6pm.

The film documents the struggles and triumphs of orphans in Central America and the volunteers who give their time and love to help make a difference in these young children's lives. You'll get to see the Pura Vida No Pro, a surfing contest created and run by volunteers in Costa Rica to benefit the orphans of Central America.Come enjoy the film and share in the experience to help spread the message of Pura Vida.

After the showing, you are welcome to come out to an after-party event at 5 Tully Alley in downtown Charleston, from 7 -10pm. Once there, you can enjoy sumptuous offerings from Normandy Farms Bakery, Coast Brewery and more. You can meet with volunteers from the film and learn more about Pura Vida and what you can do to help the cause. T-shirts, designed by the children, we be offered as will DVD and press packages about the film, the cause and the message hope we spread through the Pura Vida. Do your part, make a difference and have a great time. Tickets are $10 at the door and can be applied to t-shirt purchases, media packages available at the event.

Tickets to the film can be purchased in advance from Charleston International Film Festival's website at www.charlestoniff.com

Can't wait to see you there,
Philip

SSC-ESA Contest #1 Results-March 29 & 30, 2008
SHORTBOARD
Open:
1 Shaun Ducker
2 Anthony Osment
3 Erik Kirby
4 Kai Dilling
5 Bryant Thomas
6 Chris Costa

1A Boys Shortboard:
1 Sullivan Ware
2 Joseph Keane
3 Ian Dilling
4 Will Norrell

3A Boys Shortboard:
1 Evan Tanner
2 Evan Willis
3 Dyer Askins
4 Eric Longanecker
5 Sullivan Ware
6 Luke Pruner

Girls Shortboard:
1 Grace Muckenfuss

1A Junior Mens Shortboard:
1 JW Dukes
2 Francis Gresham

3A Junior Mens Shortboard:
1 Erik Kirby
2 Bryant Thomas
3 Christian Gaeta
4 Cooper Neil
5 Keegan Lynch
6 Eric Brown

Junior Womens Shortboard:
1 Louisa Ballou
2 Sally Walker
3 Caroline Smith
4 Parker Hiers

3A Mens Shortboard:
1 Daniel Blackwell
2 Jake Wisse
3 Ellison Thomas
4 Cory Brown

3A Womens Shortboard:
1 Caitlin Lawson
2 Jennifer Wittendorf
3 Kristin Tanner
4 Amanda Dittloff

Masters Shortboard:
1 Anthony Osment
2 Chris Costa
3 Shaun Ducker
4 Chris Jenkins
5 Carlisle Carter
6 Paul Stavovy

Senior Mens Shortboard:
1 Chris Brown
2 Kai Dilling
3 Scott Taylor

Ladies Shortboard:
1 Tara Thomas
2 Liz Sullivan

Grand Masters Shortboard:
1 Glenn Tanner
2 Rick Anson
3 Norman Godley
4 Greg Elliott
5 Thornton White
6 Bill Hogan

Legends Shortboard:
1 Rick Lawson
2 BH Rader
3 Steve Fletcher

LONGBOARD
Menehune Longboard:
1 Eric Longanecker
2 Luke Pruner
3 Dyer Askins
4 Sullivan Ware

Juniors Longboard:
1 Christian Gaeta
2 Cooper Neil
3 Keegan Lynch

Mens Longboard:
1 Preston Noto
2 Alfred Noe
3 Carlisle Carter

Womens Longboard:
1 Caitlin Lawson
2 Jennifer Wittendorf
3 Amanda Dittloff
4 Kristin Tanner
5 Kate Dittloff

Ladies Longboard:
1 Tara Thomas
2 Jewel Napier
3 Hale Horstman

Masters Longboard:
1 Paul Martin
2 Kai Dilling

Legends Longboard:
1 Glenn Tanner
2 Rick Anson
3 Norman Godley
4 BH Rader
5 Thornton White
6 Clint Thomas

Open Bodyboard:
1 Carlisle Carter
2 Stephen Fletcher
3 Jeff Linder

We are beginning our bi-monthly beach clean ups on Folly Beach again, and we’d like to get as many volunteers as we can. You would only have to sweep once a month, since we are trying to get two teams working in our two areas.

It occurs on the Tuesdays before recycling days here at Folly from 5:30-7pm.

We have two areas, the Washout and Pier area. The pier area consists of 2nd East to 3rd West. We would love to have 4 groups of 5 people. Each of the two groups would only have to do once a month.
Example:
Group A (washout)
Group B (pier)
For the first Tuesday sweep of the month
Group C (washout)
Group D (pier)
For the second Tuesday sweep of the month.
Get it?

First one is May 6th, and the Project Team Leader is Marty Morganello. Please contact him at his e-mail below so he can assign you to one of the 4 teams and get the schedule set up.

All told, you will have to do this only about 6 times through the “tourist” season.

Marty Morganello
mmorganello@bellsouth.net

Support a Responsible Wastewater Recommendation

Dear Friends,

Please click here for our new and improved letter to the COG's Special Wastewater Issues Committee.

If you have already sent an email on this issue from our prior alert, please resend a letter as there are new and important recipients in this new email message. I am sorry for any confusion that this second email may create, and thank you for taking the time to resend your email. Your emails are critical to the outcome of Tuesday's meeting.

This may be your last chance to help prohibit private ownership of wastewater treatment facilities.

The Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments’ (BCD-COG) Special Wastewater Issues Committee will be holding its third and potentially final meeting this Tuesday, March 18th at 10:00 at 1362 McMillan Ave., Suite 100, North Charleston.

The Committee was formed to address the question of whether private entities should be able to own and operate waste treatment facilities in the Tri-county area. Their decision will affect every rural area in the region, as private wastewater treatment plants allow developers to increase the number of homes they can build on rural lands. These private plants leave the responsibility for long-term maintenance of these complex systems to the land-owners and neighborhood associations. When the neighborhoods are not able to pay for or care for these systems, as has happened numerous times, the responsibility for clean up and maintenance is passed onto DHEC, the COG, and ultimately you the tax-payer.

On Tuesday, Clay Duffie from Mount Pleasant Waterworks and Lisa Hajjar from OCRM will be presenting issues and options for septic tanks and wastewater management facilities. The committee hopes to make a recommendation at the end of the meeting. You can ensure that the Committee’s decision reflects what is good for your community by writing a letter to Tim Mallard, Charleston City Councilman and Chairman of the COG’s Special Wastewater Issues Committee and the rest of the committee expressing your disapproval of private ownership and operation of wastewater facilities. Additionally, please attend Tuesday’s meeting if you are available. The committee’s recommendation has the potential to alter the rural landscape and culture of the Lowcountry.


Thank you for your support!

Lisa Jones-Turansky
Project Manager

South Carolina Coastal Conservation League
P.O. Box 1765
Charleston, SC 29402
Phone: 843.723.8035, ext. 1025
Fax: 843.723.8308

$1000 REWARD for 6 Stolen Surfboards!!!

Stolen from a Morris Square garage on Saturday, January 26, 2008:

5'8" Channel Islands Al Merrick Flyer quad-black logo/tracktop-
serial #26006

5'9" Channel Islands Al Merrick Flyer - yellow logo, black tracktop

5'10" Channel Islands Al Merrick MBM - black logo/tracktop - serial#
83927

6'4" Channel Islands Al Merrick K Small - Green bottom/rails.
serial #87083

5'6" Cordell Fish - white tracktop and orange fade to yellow logo

5'10" Cordell - red, white, and blue (USA colors) logo and black
tracktop

Other stolen items: White Dakine travel bag,

If anyone has approached you about buying a board and you can lead us
to the boards, we will gratefully pay you $1000 cash!

Please call (843) 670-6789 with any information.

The buoys have been fixed. The pier buoy is again working, but probably only until the next big NE. The Edisto Buoy is now reporting the correct winds, which was an error on my part and the months are working... for now.

Thanks to tropical storm Noel for some great waves this last week. It has been a long time since Folly has seen the kind of surf kicked up by Noel and the combination nor'easter. Big barrels were breaking everywhere from the lighthouse to the County Park and everywhere in between. There was hardly a block without a peak or a ripable wall. The crowds were out in force at the usual spots, but the size kept most of buoys out of the water.

Offshore winds, sunny skies and a solid groundswell all came together to shape one of the more memorable sessions of the year. It was awesome, maybe even 'all-time'. OK, it wasn't really 'all-time', but it was the best surf there's been in a long time. The weather was great and there were enough waves for everyone. It had been so long since all of the elements came together to shape an awesome 3 days of surf. I really hope you didn't miss it.

The Edisto Buoy (41004) is operational! It has been down for a long time, but it's back up and running and sending reports. I was hoping they would impliment wave direction, but right now, swell and wave direction are not part of the report.

In the face of this great news, the pier buoy is down again.

After trying a few different formats for buoy data, I have settled on the current model now available on the front page. I hope it's fairly self explanatory, but maybe it's not.

The Folly Pier wave height buoy is back up and running, for how long we will have to wait and see. The Edisto Buoy (41004), which had been scheduled for repair in September, is now scheduled for December. The Edisto buoy has been down for quite some time and I am looking forward to its return to functional status.

In case you haven't noticed, the wave maps have changed. You'll notice the area is now more focused for our swell window and the forecast is now only 72hrs. The map shows significant wave height and direction forecasts. A secondary swell height and direction map will be coming shortly as soon as I work out a better method to display the maps. If anyone is a Flash guru, let me know.

Well, the Surf Bar will be closing its doors Saturday night and will remained closed. The rumor is that the Surf Bar will be opening again, but the actual date is unknown. Where else we will go for Costa Rican food and surf videos in the middle of our cold, damp winter... I guess Costa Rica?

Did you make it out for McKevlin's sale last week, if you didn't, you missed out.

Well, McKevlin's is famous for their 25% off sale on everything except surfboards and services. See, McKevlin's sale has been going on so long, I know pitch by heart. Not only is everything 25% off, previously marked down items are an additional 25% off during the sale too - that's sweet. The bargains are unreal!

Every sale has a gimmick, a hook if you will, and McKevlin's is no different. For one, there's the super-secret private sale where you get an additional percentage off on everything, except surfboards and services. See, I remembered. And if saving more money wasn't incentive enough, there's also the ten minute giveaways. And these aren't the Bahama cruise kind of giveaways you see at the Chinese take-out, these prizes are something you actually want. And oh how sweet the prizes are. A certain someone, who was next to me, won a DaKine bookbag, stuffed with O'Neill, McKevlins and HIC t-shirts, a Dragon optics hat, Reef sandals, DaKine rack pads and various other surfing sundries. Yes, this was all in one prize bag. That bag was stuffed like the Grinch packed it. It was enough to make anyone (me) jealous.

All the prizes were like that, big bags stuffed with wetsuits, trackpads, sandals, watches, sunglasses, wax and more. It seemed like everyone won a prize, everyone except me. It was packed and considering the beach was flooded the whole time makes the turnout even more amazing. It's a hell of a sale and everyone knows it. Maybe if there's a hurricane and no one shows up, then I'll win one of those prize bags. Sure, I'm a little bitter I didn't win a prize - again. But I saw some great friends, had a few laughs and left with some sweet new flops my lady bought for me. Ka-ching!

Anyone who has surfed the last week, has likely felt the sting of our local jellyfish population. The water has been chocked with Cannonballs, Sea Nettles and even the dreaded Sea Wasp.

The Cannon Ball (Stomolophus meleagris) are those fun-to-throw jellyfish, which seem to be everywhere this August. Cannon Ball jellyfish have a chocolate colored banding that comes off in your hand and looks like blood, which can be cool. Instead of long tentacles, they have a short stubby group of 'stuff' where you would expect the tentacles to be. Cannon Balls don't sting, at least they don't sting me, but others report getting stung by these Ghandis of the jellyfish world.

The Sea Nettle (Chrysaora quinquecirrha) is probably what most people have been feeling in the lineup, other than the frustration of the crowds. Sea Nettles hurt and pack a pretty good wallop when they sting you. In the surf-zone, their tentacles can separate from the rest of the body sending strings of pain floating aimlessly until they float into your boardshorts and make for a very, very bad day.

The Sea Wasp (Chiropsalmus quadrumanus) is not something you would want to see in the water. The Sea Wasp is the most venomous jellyfish in our waters. You get hit by one of these and you'll know it. Rather serious pain and possibly even hospitalization can be required if you happen to find yourself tangled in their tentacles. Four groups of tentacles hanging from the four corners of the jelly and the 'box' shape make identifying this little beast.

The Portuguese Man of War (Physalia physalis) looks like a floating iridescent zip-lock bag with dreadlocks. These things don't just sting, they scare you. I've heard the tentacles can reach up to 50 feet on these, so don't paddle to get a closer look.

So, despite your best efforts, you still got stung. Great, what to do now? Well, there are a few things you can do to help ease the pain. Put in a Celine Dion CD, while it won't ease the pain, it will make your head hurt worse than the sting and distract you from the burning pain of the jellyfish. OK, don't do the Celine Dion thing, diversion isn't really a remedy anyway. Try Vinegar. Vinegar seems to help neutralize the sting cells for some people, and for some people it makes it worse. Urine reportedly helps. Urine has uric acid that's supposed to help with the pain - I don't know.

There are even products to keep you from getting stung by jellyfish. I have no idea if they work - let me know.

While looking around in my mosquito infested backyard, I came across a small patch of these beautiful little mushrooms growing underneath a Wax Myrtle. They look like they're from the genus Amanita which is responsible for about 95% of all mushroom poisoning fatalities according to Wikipedia. These things look a lot like magic mushrooms (Amanita muscaria), but there's really no way to tell without a spore test. They also look a lot like the death cap (Amanita phalloides) which probably explains why so many fatalities are attributed to this genus.

There are about 30 scattered all around the back yard and all growing under deciduous trees, except a few which are growing under a Box Wood. These mushrooms and a few species all popped up right after the heavy rains last week. There was a great fairy-ring of LBMs and some huge bright red mushrooms that didn't have gills, but I have no idea what I would take more pictures, but between the mosquitoes and the heat, I think I'd rather just sit inside.