I have archived the October 2025 water level chart (above, and at left). The drought deepened  considerably to Extreme Drought during the month with with October becoming the 4th of the last 5 months with below normal rainfall. I had hoped that the rainfall we received in September would continue into October but that was not to be. I for one have never seen it this dry. We received only 3.48 inches of rain, just shy of an inch of normal bringing us to 35.15 inches for the year to date, 0.89  inches less than normal. The lack of rainfall has predictably impacted the lake level this fall. In fact, for about a week around the middle of October and again for a few days at the end of the month, the lake level dropped down to -2.00 (and a little lower) below the high water mark, the lowest we’re allowed to draw down the lake. I wish I could blame it all on the drought conditions, but that is only part of the reason. Yes there has been evaporation this summer and fall, but we didn’t evaporate 2 feet of water! The primary cause of the low lake level is leakage through the gate and to a lesser extent through cracks between the stones.

We have been actively engaged in addressing the leaking taking place this fall and had hoped to make some temporary repairs to the dam but that has turned out not to be possible. We’re now considering permanently plugging the existing gate with concrete and sealing the leaks between the stones from the downstream side of the dam which can easily be done without needing to build a cofferdam and draining the millpond. We’re currently awaiting a proposal to do this work from Pease Construction Services, the company that repaired the dam for us in late 2018. We also anticipate fixing the leaks in this manner will be a lot less expensive than what we’ve been planning to do heretofore. While the gate is useful for managing outflows, we don’t really need it to manage the lake level, we can use the 5 foot wide weir for that purpose. The lake will overtop the dam more in coming years especially in spring and early summer, but that is not an uncommon occurrence anyways, or a particular concern: excess water has been flowing over the top of the dam since the day it was built. Plans are being considered to do this proposed work next summer. Stay tuned!

The entire State is currently either in Extreme Drought (red) or Severe Drought (orange) with only two small areas in northern Maine in Moderate Drought. Many people have had their wells go dry this fall. While we received a reasonable amount of rain in October, ground water supplies are severely depleted and it’s going to take more than a few inches of rain to replenish them. You can keep an eye on the drought conditions by visiting our Maine Drought Monitor page which is updated every Thursday.