It may have seemed like better weather for fish this week. As much as 8 inches or rain. Roads and neighborhoods underwater.

But, in reality, the fish may be getting the worst of it. Same with the lobsters and the clams and everything else living just the other side of the high-tide line.

A look at Portland Harbor shows why. That brown, murky water is full of all the stuff that got flushed off Portland and surrounding towns – oil, gasoline, cigarette butts, trash, animal waste, cigarette butts.... Did I mention cigarette butts?

Overwhelmed sewage systems added a lot of human waste and industrial effluent. And, to add insult to injury, all that freshwater itself can actually be toxic to some animals that can’t swim away or hide in their shells.

The state has banned clam digging along most of the coast because of bacteria, and few humans are likely to be swimming this week. (It’ll be nice, but not that nice). So public health isn’t an immediate concern. Unless, perhaps, if you’re on a boat.

Casco Bay is a bit of an obstacle course right now, according to those working on the water. There’s lots of debris, from large pieces of wood to a lot of trash, bobbing around in the murky swells.

The bigger, heavier obstacles, naturally, are the ones just beneath the surface and hardest to see. And, because there is no cleaning staff out on the ocean, it’ll take some time for all that debris to either drift out or find its way onto a beach somewhere.

See now, don’t you feel better?

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