It has been a long time coming, but our website now supports SSL (secure socket layer) browser connections. This means that your website traffic between our server and your browser is encrypted on-the-fly. In a world that is becoming increasingly more security (and privacy) conscious, it was really only a matter of time before we were forced to take this step. You can tell your connection to our website is secure from the lock (
) to the left of the URL in the address bar. Also the URL starts with “https” and not “http.” We’ve been planning on installing an SSL certificate for some time but lacked a real incentive to do so, the primary reason being cost. I’m happy to report now that the cost of purchasing an SSL certificate has dropped considerably in recent months such that it was really no longer Continue reading
Category Archives: Association News
23 February 2021: Spring is Coming!
It’s about this time of year that I really start hankering for Spring, and I’ve been watching the progress of the Sun anxiously as it rises a little further northward each day. By the time the Vernal Equinox on March 20th gets here, the point where it crosses the Earth’s equator on it’s way north, it will be rising well to the left of where it rose this morning:
12 February 2021: Maine Cabin Masters on Clary Lake
A camp on Clary Lake belonging to the Andersen family was featured on Maine Cabin Masters this winter. The camp is over on the west shore of the lake. I recall the camp being worked on last summer, and more than once I waved at the folks working on it while out fishing. At the time I didn’t know it was a Maine Cabin Masters project and I didn’t learn that until long after they were gone. I also lost track of this project and didn’t know when it was going to air or I’d have posted about it sooner.
Check out the Maine Cabin Masters post. The before and after pictures are impressive, and the 3D model is pretty sexy 🙂
Many thanks to Dan Burns for bringing this to my attention.
Albert R. Boynton May 18, 1926 – January 31, 2021
Albert Boynton, 1926 – 2021
I was very much saddened to hear of Albert Boynton’s recent passing. Albert was intimately familiar with the Clary Lake dam and the Clary Mill which his family owned and ran back in the 1920’s and early 1930’s. I first met Albert when I was just 13 years old when his house caught fire, back in 1966. Water from the mill pond next door was used to save his house, something he liked to point out to people. I have spoken with him often in recent years about the dam and mill and how they factored into the lives of his family.
In early 2018 the Clary Lake Association was in the process of raising money to buy the dam, and Albert made a generous donation towards that end. I took the picture at left in the late fall of that year, after we had successfully purchased the dam. It shows Albert standing next to the red mill house in which he was born, talking with our Treasurer Mary Gingrow-Shaw one day while dam repairs were underway. Albert lived just across the road from the dam and he was a frequent visitor during that exciting period. He was thrilled that the Clary Lake Association was finally able to buy the dam and restore Clary Lake. Albert has been a Clary Lake Association member for a number of years, and an unending source of stories about Clary Lake.
He will be remembered, and he will be missed.
Here is Albert’s obituary: Albert R. Boynton May 18, 1926 – January 31, 2021
This article has been posted under Members No Longer With Us which you’ll find under the Membership main menu heading.
26 January 2021: Clary_cam1 and Clary_cam3 Upgraded!
Last week Dave Knight and I upgraded Clary_cam2. Today we braved the cold and installed new cameras for Clary_cam1 and Clary_cam3. You can see all three on our Clary Lake Webcams page. The new cameras take beautiful 1920 x 1080 pixel pictures and represent a significant improvement over the old camera’s 1280 x 720 pixel pictures. All three cameras upload pictures to the website every 2 minutes. They cover the same general areas, but the fields of view are bigger than the old cameras: Continue reading
22 January 2021: Clary_cam2 Has Been Upgraded
Dave Knight and I just finished installing the new Clary_cam2. The camera’s 1920 x 1080 image needs to be adjusted slightly, it’s a little dark. I’ll swing by this weekend and tweak it a bit. As is, it’s already a big improvement from the old camera:
Here’s the old image from earlier today. As you can see, the new camera has a wider field of view and better resolution, not to mention color rendition:
I was going to replace Clary_cam3 today but I’ve run out of gumption. I’ve got 2 more cameras on order and I’m going to hold off until I can replace both Clary_cam1 and Clary_cam3, sometime next week. Stay tuned!
20 January 2021: New Webcams On The Way!
The View Out My Window
We’re in the process of replacing our webcams. We’ve got 3 of them and 2 of them are slated for replacement just as soon as I can make it happen. Clary_cam2 has lost it’s color correction and Clary_cam3 periodically uploads corrupted images. Clary_Cam1 is still working but it’s old and will be replaced soon. Continue reading
14 January 2021: Maine Lakes Wednesday Webinars Are Back!
I received this email this morning from Maine Lakes (formerly the Maine Lakes Society) and thought I’d pass it on to our Clary Lake readers. I attended several Maine Lakes webinars last year and found them interesting and educational. I’m sure this year’s programs will be as well. I’ve already signed up for the first one, Winter Lake Monitoring. There’ll be more webinars. I’ll post notices of additional programs when I receive them.
Maine Lakes Wednesday Webinars Are Back!
In light of the continuing health concerns about COVID-19, Maine Lakes will be hosting this year’s Maine Lakes Conference speakers in another series of “Wednesday Webinars” running the 1st and 3rd Wednesdays of each month, from February through June.
This year’s theme, A Deep Dive Into the Lake Book, features many interesting and relevant topics that correspond with our soon-to-be published 4th edition of “The Lake Book.” While we are currently finalizing speakers for some of the webinars, we are happy to announce that registration is open for the following presentations. Registration is free and easy. Hope to see you there!
8 January 2021: ClaryCam2 Back In Service
I’m happy to report that ClaryCam2 is back in service, thanks to David Knight’s finger which he used to press the ground fault reset button on the power supply. If we’d known it was such an easy fix we’d have taken care of it sooner. Sorry about that!
I wouldn’t normally write a website post for something as trivial as a web camera coming back online, but it turns out that the Clary Lake Web Cams page is the single most popular, most viewed page on the site 🙂
7 January 2021: It’s Ice Fishing Season Again
The 2021 Ice Fishing season has started on Clary Lake. Dave Knight stopped by the State boat launch earlier today and took the picture at left. One of the fishermen said there was 8 inches of ice. As usual, be careful especially near inlets and in the channel where moving water could affect ice thickness.
If you’re going fishing, know Maine’s Fishing Laws! You’ll need a fishing license of course. Here’s a link to Maine’s Daily Bag, Possession and Length Limits. Clary Lake is in the South Zone and the daily limit on Bass (large mouth or small mouth) is 2 fish, no size limit. However, only 1 may exceed 14 inches. It would be nice if you threw ALL the big breeder Bass back. There’s no limit on other fish species that you’ll find in Clary including White and Yellow Perch, Pickerel, and Black Crappie.
Let’s see some fish pictures! Send them to George Fergusson and I’ll post them on this website.
Holiday Greetings from the Clary Lake Association
Dear Friends and Neighbors!
The old proverbial line, ‘where did the year go’? comes to mind. And what a year it was! As professed in an earlier post, there’s always something to be grateful for. During these challenging times, we have been called upon to embrace great patience, enlist monumental courage and muster unprecedented strength. So many are suffering and we have been forced to expose ourselves… the very best and those aspects of our species that are so in need of evolving to affect real change in our society. This takes incredible perseverance, not unlike our challenges in replenishing the health of our beloved Clary Lake. So, we know the drill! Continue reading
Happy Thanksgiving 2020 from the Clary Lake Association
Everyday should be and is an opportunity to give thanks. During these difficult and unprecedented times, we can easily lose our footing in gratitude and only focus on what we don’t have, what we can’t do, and sadly for some of us, what we have lost. And so, we must remain steadfast in our work of living in the moment, taking nothing for granted and performing little acts of kindness. No earthly power can prevent us from living in this way.
May all of us, near and far, take a moment and remember what is truly important and know that it is found within. Happy Thanksgiving… now and always. Be kind and stay safe!
Margaret Fergusson
09 October 2020: Water Level Transfer Order Upheld
Following a hearing for oral arguments on September 8th, the Lincoln County Superior Court has issued its ruling on the Aquafortis Associates, LLC [AQF] Rule 80C Appeal of DEP’s December 2018 Order transferring the Clary Lake Water Level Order to the Clary Lake Association. In its discussion, the Court carefully considered all of AQF’s claims and denied or rejected all of them. The Order, issued on September 28, 2020 is subject to appeal, and AQF has 21 days from the date of the Order (deadline October 19th) to appeal the ruling to the Maine Supreme Court, but honestly, in my humble opinion, the Superior Court’s ruling was so unequivocal and final and the appeal so pointless in the first place, that I can’t imagine they will want to waste their money on a Law Court appeal, which they would undoubtedly lose. While this ruling did not come as a surprise to us, it is nice nonetheless to get the official word. The ruling is only 9 pages and well worth reading: Continue reading
24 September 2020: Drought Worsens [UPDATED]
The drought conditions affecting Maine and much of the Northeast are worsening with no relief in sight. Much of the State of Maine is now in Severe Drought (graphic, at left) including Lincoln County. Until today we were in Moderate Drought but the continuing lack of rain is taking it’s toll. We have only recorded 0.10 inches of rain so far this month back on September 2nd. Since then, nothing. Despite the dry conditions, at -14.5 inches below the HWM, the lake level really isn’t that from where we’d expect it to be this time of year. Last year at this time it was down -10.5 inches. Keep in mind that about 3 inches of that water isn’t really ours to manage because the HWM is actually 3.4 inches ABOVE the top of the dam. Perhaps a better way to think of it is we’re now down a hair over 11 inches below the top of the dam. When things are this dry, evaporation accounts for a significant amount of water loss. Also, water soaks into the ground around the edge of the lake. Downstream flows are only 2 cfs, less than the current minimum flows of 3.5 cfs.
According to the Maine Forestry Service, the fire danger is HIGH. Under the circumstances, I’d be surprised if they were issuing burn permits at all. Careful out there folks.
[UPDATE] The Maine Forestry Service HAS suspended issuing online burning permits. You or may not be able to get one from your local fire department.
13 August 2020: Hearing Scheduled for AQF Appeal
It appears the Aquafortis Associates LLC [AQF] appeal of the Water Level Order Transfer (docket AP-20-4) is going to hearing after all! A one-hour hearing for oral arguments has been scheduled in Lincoln County Superior Court on September 8th at 2:30 PM. The hearing will be held in front of the Honorable Daniel Billings using Google Meet (Google’s version of Zoom). I assume the hearing will be available to the general public but I don’t have information about how to connect yet. When I do I’ll make that information available. The State will be represented by Assistant Attorney General Scott Boak, the Clary Lake Association will be represented by Attorney Randy Creswell who so ably represented us during the Bankruptcy proceedings (and got us the dam!), and AQF is being represented by Dennis Carrillo. The Clary Lake Association is named as a Party in Interest in the appeal. Continue reading
09 July 2020: Aquafortis Associates Files Combined Reply Brief
On Thursday July 9, 2020 Aquafortis Associates, LLC [AQF] filed their reply brief in the matter of AQF v. Maine Board of Environmental Protection [BEP] Docket No. WISSC-AP-20-4, it being an appeal of a Department of Environmental Protection [DEP] Order issued in December 2018 transferring the Clary Lake Water Level Order to the Clary Lake Association. AQF filed their initial brief on May 29th of this year; their reply brief is a combined reply to both the BEP’s brief filed on June 19th and the Clary Lake Association’s brief filed on June 25th. This latest document includes 52 pages but there are a number of attachments; the actual reply brief itself is actually only 16 pages long:
Now that AQF’s petition has been fully briefed, the next step is up to the Court. The judge may schedule a hearing for oral arguments or he may just issue a ruling. I have no idea what to expect or when to expect it. I’m going to refrain from further comment at this time.
Clary Lake Birding and Marsh Paddle Event
American Bittern
Ex-president and current CLA Board member Malcolm Burson has offered to lead one or more birding excursions in the Marsh at the northwest end of Clary Lake some weekend later in July (date to be determined). Both Malcolm and his partner Eleanor Goldberg are long time birders with considerable experience spotting and identifying birds. The plan would be to meet at and leave from Malcolm’s camp around 7 AM and head down the channel towards the dam.
Since birding at this time of year is mostly all about bird songs, participation is restricted to canoes, kayaks, and boats with electric trolling motors! To keep it to a manageable sized group, we’d like to limit it to roughly 6-7 vessels at a time, that way social distancing can be maintained without people getting too spread out. If there’s sufficient interest we’ll schedule a second expedition later in early August.
Right now Saturday July 18th or Sunday July 19th are looking like workable weekends. If you’re interested in participating in this event please let us know as soon as possible and include your preferred day (Saturday or Sunday) so we can start to finalize plans. You can use our Contact Form or just let George Fergusson know. Thanks!
19 June 2020: State Files Brief in AQF WLO Transfer Appeal
On Friday June 19th the State of Maine timely filed their brief in the matter of Aquafortis Associates, LLC v. Maine Board of Environmental Protection Docket No. WISSC-AP-20-04. The original appeal was filed by AQF in December 2018 in response to DEP’s issuance of an Order transferring the Clary Lake Water Level Order from Pleasant Pond Mill LLC to the Clary Lake Association, after we bought the dam in October, 2018 and it’s taken a convoluted and circuitous route to get where we are today. If you’re wondering WHY Aquafortis Associates LLC decided to spend the time and money appealing the WLO transfer, you’re not alone. You may want to also review Aquafortis Associate LLC’s brief, previously filed on May 27th. Seeing as how this is an ongoing case in which the Clary Lake Association is an interested party, I’m going to refrain from further comment at this time.
Maine Lakes Society’s This Week’s Hero
I blame my father. I’m not one to seek attention but I suppose this is news and if I don’t share it here, no one will 🙂
From the Maine Lakes website’s 50 Lake Heroes for Our 5oth Anniversary post:
George Fergusson, Clary Lake
In 2011, Clary Lake and its Association were in trouble. A dispute with the owner of the dam controlling the lake level was leading toward seven years of unswimmable, unboatable water and significant environmental damage to the natural resource. Only 28 of 100+ littoral owners were members. Now in 2019, thanks to the unwavering efforts of George Fergusson, the Association’s long-time Secretary, the CLA has purchased and repaired the dam, the water level has been restored, and 148 (!) members can once again enjoy the benefits of a healthy lake.
George has lived on Clary Lake his entire adult life, and has been its prime steward for decades. He instigated the 2012 petition to DEP for a Lake Level Order, and then bore the brunt of legal harassment by the dam owner that prevented the Order from being implemented for five years. This included endless hours compiling and drafting documents for court, attending innumerable hearings, and managing fund-raising for legal expenses. His personal solicitation of new members meant that when the dam fell into bankruptcy, the Association could raise $120,000 for purchase and repair. George is a certified Water Quality Monitor, and has measured and maintained daily records of the lake level for years, information that was crucial to DEP’s recent approval of CLA’s Water Level Management Plan. He has been tireless in meeting with town officials, state agency staff, the press, contractors, and attorneys to keep the effort moving forward, and continually encouraged the Board of the CLA even when the quest seemed hopeless and endless.
CLA 2020 Summer Newsletter Mailed
The Clary Lake Association’s 2020 Summer Newsletter went in the mail a few days ago. If you live in Whitefield or Jefferson it has probably already been delivered. If you’re out of Town or out of State, it’ll probably take another day or two to reach you. The biggest news item is that the CLA Board at their regular May meeting a few weeks ago decided out of an abundance of caution to cancel this year’s Annual Meeting, originally scheduled for August 7th. It was not an easy decision to make, we considered just postponing it and also how we could hold a meeting while trying to maintain social distance and cancelling the pot luck supper but in the final analysis, given the uncertainty of what this summer may bring and given that pretty much all other public events have been cancelled this summer that we needed to follow suit. Dave Knight in his “President’s Message” does a good job of explaining our thought process around this issue. The health and safety of our Membership is of paramount importance. The newsletter discusses our deliberations around this issue. Continue reading