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| **\"Quapaw Canoe Company\" \<john@island63.com\>** |
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| 04/10/2008 06:27 PM                                |
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From: John Ruskey

Quapaw Canoe Company

291 Sunflower Avenue

Clarksdale, MS 38614

To: The Environmental Protection Agency

Re: EPA-- R04--OW--2008--0179

[Specific Information EPA is Soliciting on Yazoo Project
Veto:]{.underline}

Item 11: "Information about recreational uses of the area and how they
would be impacted if the pumping station is built and operated."

To Whom it May Concern:

My name is John Ruskey, I operate an outfitting operation called Quapaw
Canoe Company at mile 25 of the Sunflower River, in downtown Clarksdale,
Mississippi.

We provide canoe & kayak adventures on the Lower Mississippi River & its
lowland tributaries including the Arkansas, the White, the Yazoo and the
Big Sunflower. We need full water in free-running streams to conduct our
business. We are concerned about the Yazoo Pumps as we are about any
project that takes water away from the Delta. It's bad for paddling,
it's bad for our business.

As illustration, the drought years 2003 -- 2007 negatively affected our
operations on the Sunflower. When the water is too low, the river is
difficult to access, difficult to navigate, the camping & picnicking is
miserable. There is nothing but muddy shoals & muddy banks during low
water. There is no current. The water sours, goes putrid with algal
blooms, stinks, doesn't properly drain, the resulting smelly mess is
[not popular ]{.underline}with our paddlers, many of whom come from
around the world to experience the legendary rivers & forests of the
Mississippi Delta. It is well-known that any remaining DDT in the Delta
is deposited in the bottoms of our waterways & bodies of water \--
places that are covered during high water, places that have a high
potential for intimate contact during low.

And so it is some concern to us the proposed Yazoo pumping station at
Steele Bayou.

Us paddlers like high water, moving water, full water, free-running
water. When the water is high it allows more access into the natural
bayous and back channels of Delta National Forest. Low water results in
steep-cut muddy banks only, and no access out of the immediate river
channel. For example, at high water the beautiful Little Sunflower River
becomes accessible. The "Little" is a distributary of the "Big" at the
Western edge of Delta National Forest near Rolling Fork. At low water
the Little Sunflower is completely cut off & inaccessible.

We have been in operation for ten years. In this time we have conducted
excursions & expeditions on the Big Sunflower River for hundreds of
people, including groups from the Nature Conservancy and the Mississippi
Archeological Conservancy. We have introduced the Sunflower to writers &
photographers from *National Geographic Adventure*, *Atlantic*, *Men's
Journal*, *Outside Magazine*, and many other publications. We have
shared the river with countless local school groups, Boy Scouts & Girl
Scouts from various Mississippi troupes, Cub Scouts, and home-school
children. Every year we connect thousands of middle school children
around the country with our annual Sunflower River Expedition, an
on-line adventure classroom in coordination with Big Muddy Adventures of
St. Louis.

We operate an after-school apprenticeship program called the Mighty
Quapaws. Dozens of our apprentices have learned to paddle canoes on the
Sunflower River & build canoes at our home base on the banks of the
Sunflower in Clarksdale. How can we teach our children to paddle if
there is no water? (i.e.: it is too difficult to descend the steep muddy
banks and then slog through the stinky muddy bottoms to get to the
remaining open water?)

We at Quapaw Canoe Co. are opposed to the proposed Yazoo Pumps for the
simple fact that it will remove water from our operating range, and cut
off canoe & kayak access to the bayous, backwaters & distributary
streams of the south Delta, especially within Delta National Forest.
This includes the Little Sunflower, American Chute, McCann Bayou,
Rolling Fork and countless other high water channels. If there is no
water, there is no paddling. If the pumps are built it will be yet
another man-made determent from recreational opportunities in the
Mississippi Delta, and [will force us to find good paddling water
elsewhere]{.underline}. Furthermore, the Yazoo Pumps will give us bad
publicity amongst birders, naturalists, fishermen, canoeists, kayakers,
paddlers. In summary any & all outdoors enthusiasts world-wide will
avoid the Mississippi Delta because we keep removing the natural water
systems from their normal patterns of ebb & flow.

The Yazoo Pumps Project will be bad for our business.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me
662-627-4070, or write me at the above contact address.

Sincerely yours,

John Ruskey

Owner, Quapaw Canoe Company

PS -- We know the river well. I have lived on the banks of the river
since 1991. Today, my wife and I live on the Sunflower River, as well as
my parents, my shuttle driver, and many of my friends.