7'' mooring depth how much draft?

[evan]

The chart says seven feet how deep can I go? I''m referring to Gull Pond in Greenport on the Peconic Bay. Its very well protected and small with a narrow channel to get in and out, one boat at a time. I cant see how waves could be a big issue.

Thanks
Evan

There are a couple pieces to this question. First of all, charts only show mean low water. Tides can vary by several feet below mean low water. Pick up a tide book for your area and you will see that a good tide book will have a time and a plus or minus number next to the time. If you look at the low tide numbers you should see that some will have negative numbers next to them telling you the amount below mean low that you should exect. These vary from tide to tide.

The second part of your question is wind affect. A small body of water with a narrow entrance located off of another (larger but still) small body of water, like Peconic Bay, can have significant water blown out of it by a continuous strong wind. On Spa Creek, where I used to keep my boat, off Chesapeake Bay the wind could drop the tide by as much as two feet.

Lastly there is wave action. Even in a well protected harbor you can get as much as a foot of fall simply from wakes or short fetch wind conditions against a tide.

Jeff

[evan]

Thanks for the advise. I took a quick look in the Eldridge tide book, didn''t see the plus/minus sign. Its probably there, I''ll take a closer look.

I defiantly want a fixed keel. I''ve read allot of your posts, a Laser 28 is on my list. I''ll save that discussion for another thread.

Evan