Category Archives: Association News

Posts about Clary Lake Association stuff.

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!

The 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 →

21 May 2019: One Casualty of the Site Migration

There was one regrettable casualty of the otherwise successful site migration: the list of 50+ or so people who had signed up to receive email notices of new website posts was lost. This list was maintained by WordPress so I have no idea who was subscribed or what email addresses were used. If you were on that list and want to get back on that list, you’ll have to resubscribe. Look for the “Subscribe to Blog via Email” form on the sidebar. Just enter your email address, respond to the “Confirm your subscription for Clary Lake Association” email you’ll receive, and you’ll be back on the list. If you’re viewing the site’s mobile theme on a phone or tablet, first look for the “View Full Site” link at the bottom of the main page and then you’ll be able to subscribe. Sorry for the inconvenience.

21 May 2019: CLA Site Migration Complete

Yesterday morning I posted about plans to migrate the Clary Lake Association website to a new platform. Ironically, in the process of completing the move, that posted got wiped out. I’m happy to report that we completed the migration around midnight last night without any major problems, though as predicted, the Clarycams broke spectacularly. We got those working this morning.

We’ve made no significant changes to the content on the site, but everyone should notice a significant decrease in page load times. Page load speeds have been reduced partly thanks to faster hardware but also to site optimization. We’ll be making some additional optimizations over the next week or so which should help improve site performance. If anyone has any issues with the site, you know how to reach me.

CLA Spring/Summer 2019 Newsletter Mailed

The Clary Lake Association’s Spring/Summer 2019 Newsletter went in the mail a couple of days ago. This year we mailed about 225 newsletters, our largest mailing yet. They’ve already been delivered to most local addresses, but if yours is going out of town it will probably take a few more days to reach you. Traditionally the Summer newsletter kicks off our Membership Drive for the upcoming year which runs from Annual Meeting to Annual Meeting. This year’s meeting is going to be held at the Clary Lake dam on Saturday August 3, 2019. Continue reading →

04 May 2019: BEP Hearing on AQF Appeal of Transfer Order Scheduled

You may recall that back in December the DEP issued an Order transferring the Clary Lake water level order to the Clary Lake Association (see 11 December 2018: Clary Lake Water Level Order Transfer Complete). You may also remember that Richard Smith, owner of Aquafortis Associates LLC (AQF) subsequently appealed the Transfer Order to the Board of Environmental Protection (see 26 December 2018: Aquafortis Appeals CLA License Transfer). Today I received 2 heavy manila envelopes in the mail, one addressed to me and one to President Malcolm Burson, each containing 98 pages of documents pertaining to Aquafortis’s appeal. A hearing on the appeal has been scheduled for Thursday May 16, 2019 beginning at 9:00 AM. The meeting is going to be at the Augusta Civic Center at 76 Community Drive in Augusta. Continue reading →

01 May 2019: DEP Approves Water Level Management Plan

We have received provisional approval of our Water Level Management Plan [WLMP] from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection. The WLMP details the procedures we’ll be following to operate the Clary Lake dam and manage the water level so as to remain in compliance with the Clary Lake Water Level Order [WLO]. The completion of a management plan was the final requirement of the WLO and it’s good to have this task behind us. This first season is like a shakedown cruise: we’ll be sitting down with DEP staff next winter to review the plan to see how well it’s met everyone’s needs. Continue reading →

29 April 2017: Midcoast Conservancy Info-Session on Browntail Moths

Browntail Moth Caterpillar

For those of you who are interested in learning more about Browntail moths (which should be pretty much all of you), the Midcoast Conservancy has finally posted the video of the program on Browntail Moths that they put on back on April 4th at the Edgecomb Eddy School. You’ll find a link to that video along with other useful information about these insect pests.

https://www.midcoastconservancy.org/browntail-moth-info-session/

26 April 2019: Water Monitoring Resumes for 2019

David measures the wind speed, direction, and temperature.

Kelsie French, David Hodsdon, and I headed out today to kick off the 2019 Clary Lake water quality monitoring season. David started monitoring on Clary Lake in 1975, making this his 44th year on the job! The average secchi disk reading was 3.75 meters (12.3 feet) which is about average for this time of year- spring rains and runoff carries silt into the lake which reduces transparency. It’ll clear up some as summer approaches. Dissolved Oxygen pretty uniform throughout the water column, also a normal condition for this time of year. We had planned on obtaining a water sample for Phosphorus testing but the weather today just wasn’t conducive to spending any more time on the water than we had to. After all, it’s not like we were fishing. At 9.8° C the water temperature was actually warmer than the air! All I can say is I look forward to more pleasant weather this year than what we had to put up with today!

You’ll find water quality data back to 2012 on our Clary Lake Water Monitoring Data page.

24 April 2019: Water Over The Dam

We’ve received a lot of rain over the past week resulting in a full lake and a nice sedate outflow over the dam. Older folks will recall that this is what Spring is like on Clary Lake. There’s about 2.5″ of water going over the dam and the estimated discharge is about 70 cubic feet per second.

14 April 2019: Ice Out!

Finally, Clary Lake is ice free! I know most of you on the north and northwest shores have had open water for the better part of a week, but ice persisted on the south and east sides until yesterday. Even this morning (picture at left) there was still a large raft of ice down by the State boat launch, which largely disappeared by noon. While ice out seemed to take forever this year, the median date for ice out is April 13th (half occur before and half occur after that date) so we’re really right about on schedule. Ice out means ALL the ice is melted. Check out our Ice-In and Ice-Out page which has records going back to 2001.

Let the boating begin!

05 April 2019: Test #1 Of Email Alert System Sent

Yesterday I posted that we were going to start testing our “Lake Shore Owner Notification System” soon. This afternoon I actually sent the first of likely several test emails to Clary Lake shore owners and Clary Lake Association members. This mailing went out to 132 people and so far at least, there have been no bounces.

If you think you should have received an email but didn’t, first check your spam folder and if you find it there, just tell your email program that it isn’t spam! Another possibility is that we don’t have your email address on file. If that’s the case, please email me and I’ll add your address to our list. If you’re one of the few people left who really don’t have an email address, relax: I’ll be sending around a test postcard sometime next week. I’ve also created a simple Google Spreadsheet to keep track of the alerts and have added an Email Alert System page with information about the system. You can also sign up for E-Alerts.

Stay tuned. The fun is just beginning.

04 April 2019: Testing of Lake Shore Owner Notification System to Start Soon

Now that the lake level staff gauge installation has been approved by DEP, the remaining requirement of the Clary Lake Water Level Order already under way but yet to be completed is a Water Level Management Plan [WLMP], defined in Special Condition #5 of the WLO. The Board has been working on it off and on for most of the winter and it is now in the final review stage. We’ll make it available as soon as it is finished and has been approved by the DEP. Copies will also be posted at the Whitefield and Jefferson Town Offices.

One of the requirements of the WLMP is that we develop a procedure for alerting people 1) of possible flooding events and 2) repair or maintenance procedures on the dam that are expected to appreciably affect lake levels. We propose to 1) post notices on this website and on Facebook and 2) send email notices to those people for whom we have email addresses and by postcard to those people without email. We’re in the process of setting up this notification system now and will start testing it in the near future. I’ll soon be adding a page on this site to keep track of water level related events and notices sent. Continue reading →

02 April 2019: Midcoast Conservancy to Offer Informational Meeting on Browntail Moths

We have a growing Browntail Moth problem in our area. Several people around Clary Lake have recently brought the problem to my attention. They’ve been around a while, so you may be familiar with them already. If not, you should familiarize yourselves with these critters. They’re nasty. Besides being bad for the trees (primarily Oaks, but they infest other varieties), the caterpillars have tiny hairs which can cause serious problems for people. Our area has until recently been considered a “Low Risk” area for Browntails, but from my recent observations it sure looks like they’re rapidly becoming a significant problem. Continue reading →

01 April 2019 Video: Lake at HWM, Water Over the Dam

For the first time in over a decade, the water level of Clary Lake is at the HWM and there is water going over the dam. No this isn’t an April Fools joke, here’s the video to prove it:

30 March 2019: Fire Spreads to Multiple Buildings at N.C. Hunt Lumber

N.C. Hunt Lumber Company on Route 215 in Jefferson suffered a major loss due to fire that apparently started late last night. Fire crews from Jefferson and surrounding towns were still there this morning pumping water out of Clary Lake. Here’s an article from the online version of the Lincoln County News:

Fire Destroys Sawmill at N.C. Hunt Lumber in Jefferson, Business Plans to Rebuild

I stopped down this morning when I heard about the fire, and took the photograph at left of fire trucks pumping water out of Clary Lake. We have been planning for some time to install a dry fire hydrant at this location. Fortunately, the lake is almost full and they were able to get plenty of water or they might have lost more structures in the fire.

Jack Holland sent me a the drone photo at left which I believe was taken by Mark Allen. You can clearly see the main sawmill structure and associated buildings are totally gone. It is amazing they didn’t lose more structures.