Yearly Archives: 2019

04 August 2019: Loon Nest Update

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Sitting Loon. Photo by Carolyn Curtis.

It is hard to believe at this late date that the loons are still sitting on the nest, but that is the case. I was convinced the nest had been abandoned so I picked up my new neighbor Carolyn Curtis and we boated over to look at the nest site today, not sure what we were going to find. On our way over we saw 3 loons swimming. Imagine our surprise to arrive at the nest to find a loon sitting on it! We got to within 3-4 feet before we were able to spot the bird. While I quickly 2019080495195217reversed oars and started to pull my boat away, Carolyn stood up and snapped this picture with her phone. It’s a great shot. You can clearly see the loon’s head and back. Very well hidden. The picture at left is a blow up of the original picture that Carolyn sent me, it clearly shows the loon’s back, head, and red eye.

Last year the loon chicks were first spotted on June 24th which was if anything a bit early. Early July is more normal, and late July not too uncommon. But still sitting in August? I’ve never heard of such a thing! Given the late date, the prospects for the loon family being able to raise chicks to flying age before winter are not good. It will be tight. Stay tuned.

July 2019 Water Level Chart Archived

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July 2019

I have archived the July 2019 Water Level Chart (at left). The most notable thing about this chart is it shows rainfall fell off a cliff in July with only 2.39 inches being recorded for the month, over an inch less than the average of 3.54 inches for July. The latter part of the month has been driest: we’ve only received 0.16 inches of rain since July 13th. That said, due to the above-average rainfall received in April, May, and June, we’re still 0.65 inches above the yearly average for this date. While we’re not in official drought territory yet, we will be soon if this dearth of rainfall continues.

The lake level has fallen since the first of the month, starting out 0.13 feet above the HWM and ending the month 0.32 feet below the HWM, a total range of only 0.45 feet. Still, despite the lack of rain, the lake level is higher now than it historically would be on this date; water was still flowing over the top of the dam until just a few days ago. We’ve only been able to maintain this high water level because of the dam repairs we made late last fall which has reduced leaks to a just a few cubic feet per second, which conveniently supplies the minimum flows (1.9 cfs) for this time of year. We anticipate the lake level will continue to fall an additional 6-8 inches through the month of August, depending on rainfall. Continue reading →

28 July 2019: Maine CDC confirms case of Powassan virus

One more reason to hate ticks, as if we needed another.

Maine CDC confirms case of Powassan virus

July 24, 2019
Human Services

AUGUSTA – The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Maine CDC) has confirmed a case of Powassan virus infection in a Maine resident, the first case of the tick-borne illness in the state since 2017.

Maine CDC received notification of the case this week from the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services. The adult individual resides in southern Maine and has been hospitalized in New Hampshire. It is believed that the individual contracted the illness in Maine. Continue reading →

23 July 2019: CLA Annual Meeting and Community Cookout Update

Plans for the 2019 Clary Lake Association Annual meeting are coming along nicely! The meeting will be held at 2:00 PM sharp at the Clary Lake dam on Saturday August 3rd. There will be a short business meeting to start followed by our main program including a presentation by Midcoast Conservancy’s Maranda Nemeth about their hopes to establish fish passage  into Clary Lake, and a discussion of our Association’s long term goals led by outgoing President Malcolm Burson. Since our membership year runs from annual meeting to annual meeting, in order to participate in the meeting (i.e. vote, speak) you need to be a paid up member. If you plan to pay your dues at the meeting (as many people do) please arrive a little early! We’ll have a registration desk set up by 1:00 PM and plan to start the meeting promptly at 2:00 PM. You can also sign up online. Dues are $25 per year per person.

There will be a number of canopies set up to provide shade along with tables and chairs but it can’t hurt to bring a folding chair or 2 if you have them. We’re expecting the field adjoining the dam property to have been hayed by the time of the meeting so parking should not be a problem.

We have traditionally held a pot-luck supper at the conclusion of our Annual Meeting. This year have decided to invite the larger community of lake lovers to join us in celebration of our restored natural treasure. A cookout open to the public will start at 4 PM. The Clary Lake Association will be offering hot dogs, hamburgers (and some veggie burgers) and an assortment of beverages, and we encourage folks who plan to attend to bring an offering of a side dish or dessert to round out the fare. We also plan to polish off the ice cream left over from our recent Ice Cream Social. The cookout and food is free but donations will be gratefully accepted. We hope to see you there!

A final reminder: for some time now, full Membership in the Association is open to “all persons who support the purpose of the Association as stated in the bylaws and who pay annual dues to the Corporation.” You need not be a Clary Lake shore owner to be a Member, we’re especially interested in attracting New Members from the wider community.  There is strength in numbers, and we encourage you to invite your neighbors and friends of Clary Lake to come to the Meeting and join us in our celebration. See you at the Annual Meeting!

16 July 2019: Ice Cream Social a Great Success!

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Two of our event-coordinators Kelsie French (left) and Melissa Palmer-Karas.

Our first Ice Cream Social was a great success! By the middle of the afternoon there were about 50 people hanging out on the Clary Lake dam property and on the adjoining property belonging to neighbors Steve & Julie Cowles. Many thanks to them for their help getting the site ready and allowing us the use of their property. It was a beautiful sunny day and the canopies we set up provided much appreciated shade. Jeff French and his family arrived by boat! Many thanks to our volunteers for pulling off such a well-organized event and special thanks to Joe Holland of the Jefferson Scoop for donating tasty Gifford’s Ice Cream,  and to Linda Gallion who brought home made chocolate and strawberry ice cream. This wasn’t really intended to be a fund raiser, but we did collect over $70 in our donation jar which helped cover the costs. Next year we’ll do a better job with promotion.

Sorry for not posting something sooner, but the past couple of days have been pretty hectic. Here is a gallery of pictures from the event. I’ll get around to adding some captions when I find a round tuit:

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Clary Lake Association Ice Cream Social Reminder!

Ice Cream!Just a reminder that our Ice Cream Social is this coming Sunday July 14th at 2 PM at the Clary Lake dam! The weather is looking perfect with temps in the mid-80s. Stop by and make yourself a Sundae! Bring a friend! We’ll have some tables and chairs set up, and some canopy tents so you can get out of the sun if you wish. Here’s a link to the original post about this event:

Clary Lake Association Ice Cream Social July 14th

One thing we forgot to mention in the original post is that The Jefferson Scoop has donated two tubs of ice cream to the event! Help us spread the word, because ice cream!

Hope to see you there!

08 July 2019: Aquafortis Associates LLC Appeals BEP Ruling

In a move that defies understanding, Aquafortis Associates LLC (AQF) has decided to appeal the June 6th Board of Environmental Protection (BEP) ruling denying their appeal of the DEP transfer of the Water Level Order to the Clary Lake Association (see “06 June 2019: BEP Denies AQF Appeal“). This new Petition for Review of Final Agency Action, Docket No. AP-2019-TBA, was filed today in Kennebec County Superior Court by counsel for AQF Dennis Carrillo. Mr. Carrillo has represented Richard Smith and AQF in both the Paul Kelley Bankruptcy proceeding and the Rubin/Ayer lawsuit. The petition names the Board of Environmental Protection as the Defendant and they will be doing the heavy lifting in this court case. The Clary Lake Association has been named a Party-In-Interest. I am not going to comment further until I’ve had a chance to read the Petition carefully. Without further palaver:

Stay Tuned!

Clary Lake Association Ice Cream Social July 14th

CLARY LAKE ASSOCIATION
ICE CREAM SOCIAL

Stop by the Clary Lake Dam site on Mills Road in Whitefield and join us as we continue to celebrate the return of fun and frolic on our beloved and restored Clary Lake!! On Sunday, July 14th @ 2PM we will be treating Members (if you’re not currently a Member, consider becoming one!) and our community friends and neighbors to an ice cream social. We’ll be featuring ice cream supplied by some good folks in Jefferson…our friends and supporters, Joe Holland, who owns and operates The Jefferson Scoop, and Linda and Rick Gallion of Clary Lake Bed and Breakfast (they make their own!!).

Plan on staying a while… there will be tables and chairs so you can sit and linger with friends, awnings to get out of the sun, and water to keep you hydrated… and most importantly—plenty of ice cream! We hope to see you there!!

We’ve added this event to our Upcoming Events Calendar and you can also keep track of it on the countdown timer on the sidebar to the right. We’ll post updates here as the event approaches!

 

05 July 2019: Moderate Algae Bloom in Progress

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Cyanobacteria coloring the water.

You may have noticed a green scum drifting on the lake surface recently or seen loads of green particles suspended in the water and thought it was pollen. Well, it does look a lot like the pine pollen that was blowing around last week, but that was yellow, and this stuff is green. Clary Lake is actually experiencing moderate blue-green algae growth resulting in an algal bloom. This early season algae bloom has no doubt been fueled by excessive runoff from all the rain this spring (15″ since the 1st of April!) which has introduced Phosphorus and other nutrients into the lake. Phosphorous is the primary food for plants and algae. Blue-green algae technically is a phylum of bacteria (cyanobacteria) that obtain their energy through photosynthesis. Another likely source of Phosphorus is rotting terrestrial vegetation. For years, better than 300 acres of drained wetlands have been growing grass, goldenrod, alders, and other terrestrial plants and that land is now under water, and the vegetation is rotting. This releases nutrients including Phosphorus in the water, helping to fuel aquatic plant and algae growth. Here are a few more photographs:

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All this rainfall has also resulted in significant flushing of Clary Lake, well in excess of normal. Since January 1st, the lake’s entire volume of water (7,224 acre-feet) has been replaced almost twice. The inverse of the flushing rate is retention time (how long water stays in the lake) and that figure has decreased to about 92 days. The published “flushing rate” for Clary Lake is 1.81 times per year. We’re going to exceed that value by a significant amount. This will help “wash out” the nutrients currently in the lake, but will also result in more nutrients being brought into the lake. This is why controlling non-point sources of soil erosion and sedimentation is So Important: it doesn’t help replacing nutrient-laden water with more nutrient-laden water.

I expect this current algal bloom to dissipate soon, and it remains to be seen if we’ll have additional algae growth this year. Under the circumstances, I wouldn’t be surprised. It is important to remember that even though the dam has been repaired and the lake level restored, the ecology of Clary Lake has been severely damaged as a result of the 8 years of low water and it going to take some time to recover. Clary is still at-risk from both natural and man-caused issues and deserves our ongoing attention.

03 July 2019: Clary Lake Association Putting a Float in Whitefield 4th of July Parade

Whitefield 4th of July Parade, 2010

The Clary Lake Association has been threatening to put a float in the Whitefield 4th of July Parade for a few years, and we’re finally doing it! With everything that’s been going on, I completely forgot to post anything about it so sorry for the late notice! The parade starts at 10 AM. Come on down to Kings Mills (intersection of Route 194 and Townhouse Road) and cheer us on. If you’d like to ride on the float or have kids that would like to ride on the float, be at the intersection of Route 194 and Route 218 at after 9 and before 10. Hope to see you there!

June 2019 Water Level Chart Archived

6 Clary-Lake-Water-Level-Precipitation-June-2019I have archived the June 2019 Water Level Chart (at left). The most notable thing about this chart is that it shows we received 6.72″ of rain in June which has got to a record of some sort. As a result, the lake level has remained very close to or slightly above the HWM elevation of 151.17 feet with water flowing over the top of the dam for the entire month. In fact, water has been flowing over the top of the dam since April 1st, which is quite unusual. Average rainfall for June is “only” 3.73 inches and we exceeded that amount by almost exactly 3 inches. This puts us going into summer 1.8 inches ahead of average precipitation for this date. We expect the lake level to gradually drop over the next 2 months, assuming precipitation returns to something more like normal.

Minimum Flows drop today to 1.9 cubic feet per second (cfs), the lowest outflow rate of the year. Outflows will remain at this level through September 15th when they go up to 3.5 cfs.

I’m liking the new water level chart pictured above. What I like most about it is I’ve spent exactly NO TIME uploading daily updates as the charts are generated dynamically by Google.  That said, I’m still tweaking the design.

Courtesy Boat Inspection Training Set For July 1st

HYDRILLA (Hydrilla verticillata)

Back in late May I posted about the CLA’s plans to participate in the State’s Courtesy Boat Inspection program, which is administered by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection. It has taken a while, but we have finally received a date for Courtesy Boat Inspection (CBI) training: Monday July 1st at 3:30 pm at Coastal Rivers Conservation Trust in Damariscotta which is located right across the road from Hammond Lumber Co. on Business Route One. The address is 3 Round Top Lane, Damariscotta ME 04348.  This training is a joint venture of Midcoast Conservancy and Coastal Rivers Conservation Trust and is being provided free-of-charge.
 
From the Midcoast Conservancy website:

What do courtesy boat inspectors do? The program is really an educational one. As boaters launch and remove their boats from the water, CBIs will discuss with boaters how invasive aquatic plants spread, show how to inspect boats and equipment for plant fragments, urge boaters to inspect before and after every launch, distribute information about invasive plants, and articulate Maine law regarding the transport of these plants.

We need volunteers! Our goal is to line up enough Courtesy Boat Inspectors to be able to cover the State boat launch on Clary Lake during the “busy” hours (7 AM to 3 PM) on weekends, as those are the days that typically see the most boat traffic. Typically volunteers would sign up for 2 hour shifts, and inspections would continue through Labor Day. If you’re interested in helping out with this important initiative, please contact the Secretary.

Glenn B. MacDonald Feb. 26, 1947-May 26, 2019

Glenn B. MacDonald
Feb. 26, 1947-May 26, 2019

June 11, 2019

Major MacDonald was born in Gardiner, Feb. 26, 1947, the son of the late Mrs. Marian Graffam of Rome, N.Y., and the late Judge Paul A. MacDonald, of Woolwich, Maine.

He was educated at Higgins Classical Institute in Charleston and The University of Maine in Augusta. He also graduated from many Army service schools and won numerous journalistic awards as editor of Guardlife Magazine.

He was also a retired major in the U.S. Army Reserve, having risen in the ranks as an enlisted man, non-commissioned officer, company grade and field grade officer. Major MacDonald was a U.S. Army combat correspondent in 1971 and 1973. He also covered fighting in Laos and Cambodia. Continue reading →

06 June 2019: BEP Denies AQF Appeal

Winning!In a decision that should come as a surprise to no one, the Board of Environmental Protection after listening to comments from Aquafortis Associates LLC [AQF] and others, summarily denied AQF’s appeal of the December 2018 DEP Order transferring the Clary Lake Water Level Order to the Clary Lake Association. The Board also denied several parties requests for a public hearing. So the DEP Transfer Order stands.

The information-gathering portion of the hearing lasted over 2 hours, the bulk of which was used by attorney for AQF Dennis Carrillo to explain and justify AQF’s appeal; this was a non-testimonial hearing and the record was closed which means all of AQF’s attempts to supplement the record with additional material were for naught. After AQF spoke, CLA President Malcolm Burson issued a short statement on the Association’s position- basically that we filed a satisfactory application and did everything right and in a timely fashion and that we applaud the Department’s decision to transfer the Order to us. Finally, counsel for DEP spoke briefly stating their opinion that the DEP had covered all the bases and that the CLA transfer application was deemed satisfactory and complete. The Board then asked if there were any additional comments; Butch Duncan spoke briefly about his desire for a public hearing, and Paul Kelley spoke about why the thinks the Clary Lake Association lacks sufficient Right, Title, and Interest in the Clary Lake dam to operate it, an argument that Mr. Carrillo also attempted to make. The Board however correctly observed that there is a forum for resolving title issues, and they aren’t it.

The Board deliberated for all of about 2 minutes before issuing their unanimous decision denying the appeal.

A number of CLA Board members and several Clary Lake Association members attended the hearing. I have no idea how many people if any listened in on the DEP Virtual Meeting Room, if you did I’d be interested in hearing your reactions.

05 June 2019 Reminder: BEP Hearing on AQF Appeal This Thursday

Just a reminder that the Board of Environmental Protection hearing on Aquafortis Associates LLC’s appeal of the DEP’s Transfer Order is tomorrow, Thursday June 6 at 9:00 AM at the Augusta Civic Center. This hearing is the result of an appeal filed by Richard Smith of Aquafortis Associates LLC back in December 2019 and was originally scheduled for May 16th but was rescheduled at the last minute to June 6th at the request of counsel for AQF. You might want to review the previous posts on this matter for more information; here are the two most recent:

The hearing is expected to last about 45 minutes. If you can’t attend in person but would nonetheless like to listen to it online, you’ll find directions for how to do that in the 04 May 2019 post.

01 June 2019: The Loons Are Nesting!

DSC_6353The Loons are nesting in the traditional location in the deep inlet on the north shore of the lake, the same place they nested last year, but deeper in the cove because of the higher water. I spotted the location on May 30th, and it is well hidden: if I hadn’t seen one of the loons hanging around the area, I’d never have known it was there. I was able to get one (not very good) photograph of the loons on the nest (below). In previous years, fluctuating water levels have made successful nesting a real challenge with the biggest risk being flooding due to a rapid rise in water level. The good news this year is the lake level is already at the High Water Mark and stable, so even if we get heavy rains, the lake level won’t rise enough to flood the nest. Continue reading →

May 2019 Water Level Chart Archived

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May 2019

I have archived the May 2019 Water Level Chart (at left). The most notable thing about this chart is that it shows the lake level hovered around the Normal High Water Mark for the entire month, something that hasn’t happened since last month 🙂 More to the point, this is the last in this hand-made series of water level charts that I’ll be producing. I’ve been threatening to stop making these charts for a while, but old habits are hard to break. This time I’m really done. I started 8 years ago in January 2012 at the start of our long water level crisis. The introduction of the new Dam Operation Log however with its own automatically generated charts and graphs has made these traditional charts a duplicated (and wasted) effort. I have better things to do now and I just can’t justify the time and effort to continue making them. Since starting recording water level measurements in December 2011, I’ve made 2700 individual water level measurements and posted 101 Monthly water level charts. It’s the end of an era, and about time!

The Current Water Level Charts page will remain but with a new look and sporting new automatically-generated charts and graphs from the Dam Operations Log.

Finally, it was a wet month. We received 3.88 inches of rain for the month, slightly more than the average for May. For the year at 15.96″ which is right about where we’re supposed to be.

24 May 2019: CLA To Conduct Courtesy Boat Inspections

HYDRILLA (Hydrilla verticillata)

With the State boat launch back in service, our concerns rightly turn to protecting Clary Lake from the chance introduction of invasive aquatic plant species. To that end, the Clary Lake Association is gearing up to start participating in Maine’s Courtesy Boat Inspection (CBI) program starting this summer, and we’re going to need volunteers! While there are various ways invasive plants can make it into lakes, by far the most common transport mechanism is on boats and trailers. Sadly, there are a number of lakes in the State with an invasive aquatic plant problem including several nearby lakes. The goal will be to have enough people lined up and trained so that the boat launch can be covered during the weekends to inspect boats and trailers before they they put in the lake, to make sure there are no invasive plants hitching a ride. Continue reading →