Jack Holland and I performed out bi-monthly water quality monitoring boat trip this morning and obtained a secchi disk reading of 1.80 meters (5.9′) indicative of an algae bloom in progress. This does not come as a huge surprise since we’ve entered a bloom state about this time of year for the past 4+ years. Still, it was an unpleasant discovery. I’ve posted today’s data on the Clary Lake Water Monitoring Data page. Scott Williams of the Volunteer Lake Monitor Program has been notified of the bloom.

Algae blooms are caused by the out-of-control growth of blue-green algae known as cyanobacteria. The most common cyanobacteria is Anabena, shown at left. Algae feeds primarily on phosphorus washed into the lake by runoff  and released from bottom sediments in low-oxygen conditions. Undoubtedly the 7.65″ of rain and the resulting runoff we received in July contributed to this bloom, but the lower water levels resulting in reduced lake volume and sediments exposed to wave action and erosion certainly didn’t help any. Here are some pictures of what we can look forward to in about 2 weeks:

Clary Lake now has 3 volunteer water monitors certified by the Maine Volunteer Lake Monitor Program: David Hodsdon #HO-0042, Jack Holland #HO-0551, and as of last Friday 11 July 2014, myself (George Fergusson) #FE-2648. I’ve been meaning to pursue certification for some time but finally found the time and initiative to do so. At this time I’m only certified/qualified to collect secchi disk readings and surface-grab Total Phosphorus tests, but I plan to get qualified later this summer on the use of the Association’s YSI Pro20 digital dissolved oxygen meter and the more comprehensive core water sample technique for phosphorus.

Continue reading →

I’ve archived the May 2014 water level chart. We started the month about -29″ below the top of the dam and ended the month at a little over 42″ below the top of the dam, this despite the dam’s gate being wide open for the entire month. All told we received 3.92″ of rain in May, which is about average. This rainfall offset the falling lake level to the tune of about 15″.

There is a pair of loons on the lake this year, and May is the month when they would normally start nesting. It appears however that the lake level has been too variable this spring for them to even consider building a nest, at least I haven’t seen them nesting. Better luck next year.

Not that unusual to see a Bald Eagle around Clary Lake in recent years, but it’s a little unusual to wake up and find one looking in your bedroom window.

David Hodsdon makes the official determination of ice-in and ice-out on Clary Lake and according to him, ice-out occurred sometime between 4 and 5 pm on April 14th. His criteria for ice-out is all the ice out of all the coves. He also notes that the loons were back on the 12th, a fact I can confirm from my own observations. Even though it seems like a late spring, a look at the ice-in and ice-out records going back to 2001 show that this year’s date is about average.

It sure did go out fast once it started to go.

Spring has arrived! I’m sure of it! Less than a week ago there were people ice fishing on the lake and at the time I speculated that it would be at least 3 weeks before the ice went out. Today, there’s a significant amount of open water on the north shore of the lake and the remaining ice looks very gray indeed. You can see the open water in the picture at left. What a difference a week makes! Now I’m thinking the ice will be gone in another week or less. We’ll see. There is open water around the edge of much of the lake. racket. I plan to launch my kayak this weekend and see if I can make it up to the channel. You can also see piles of white here and there around the lake where the wind has driven the ice up on to the shore. I recall this happening on my shoreline early one winter some years ago, the ice actually piled up 4′-5′ thick and it made an awful racket!

You may have notice that the lake level is higher now than it has been for some time. In fact, it’s only been this high 2 other times in the last 3 years. As high as it seems however, it’s still 20″ below the top of the dam. Though the gate is open, the ground where not frozen is saturated and most precipitation runs right off. We’ve received only 1.21″ of rain so far this month but the lake came up 20″ for a runoff multiplier of about 16x. I think a more reasonable multiplier would be 10x as snow melt accounts for about 7″ of that rise.

There is almost 3.5′ of water over the foot of the ramp at the State Boat Launch, more than a foot more than the design minimum so those of you so inclined to launch your boats this spring shouldn’t have too much trouble though don’t expect the water level to remain high this summer. We’ll see what the fall brings.

I posted the above picture in the Winter 2014 album. I should have posted it in the Spring 2014 album, but there isn’t one yet. I’ll get right on that.

Jack Holland forwarded me a copy of a Damariscotta Lake Watershed Association (DLWA) notice about an upcoming workshop they’re giving intended to train volunteers to identify and categorize Non-Point-Source (NPS) pollution sites. The end goal is performing a Watershed Survey for Damariscotta Lake, a truly daunting task give the size of Damariscotta Lake’s wateshed. The Clary Lake Association performed such a watershed survey for Clary Lake back in 2001 (see our Clary Lake Watershed Survey Basemap) and at last year’s Annual Meeting we formed an ad-hoc committee to work to update that survey in the near future.  Some of our NPS committee members will need some training too so I’ve written to Garrison Beck to see if we can participate in the training. I’ll let you know what I find out. Here’s the email notice:

Do you want to help protect the water quality of Damariscotta Lake? Then join us on Saturday, April 26th from 9am – 3pm at DLWA for training needed to be part a team that will find and locate harmful sources of pollution.   

After the training, you will work with DLWA staff and other volunteers to conduct a complete survey of the Damariscotta Lake Watershed looking for sites of non-point source pollution. In brief, non-point source pollution is all pollution in the watershed that cannot be attributed to a single point (ex. a pipe). This pollution comes mostly in the form of erosion and runoff from the land, which carries nutrients such as phosphorus and nitrogen into the lake and its tributaries.

Our watershed is over 30 square miles and we need your help! Your job would entail walking the near-shore area on Damariscotta Lake and driving watershed roads looking for sites of erosion and runoff. Our goal is to complete the entire survey within one month of the training!

If you are interested in attending the training or assisting in any other way, please contact Garrison Beck at 207-549-3836 or garrison@dlwa.org.

Maine lakefront property owners should know that a bill is now before the legislature that would finally provide some significant funding for those working to control invasive aquatic plant infestations. LD 1626 was presented by Representative Mike McClellan of Raymond. It would raise the milfoil sticker fees for in-state boats by $7 and $15 for out-of-state boats. The proceeds would help fund suction harvesting, bottom barrier work and hand-pulling. You can read the whole article at: http://blog.mrlakefront.net

Thanks to Jack Holland for bringing this to my attention.

Dead blue-green algae

For the second time this summer we’re seeing evidence of a major blue-green algae bloom. Since it’s late in the season nobody has really noticed the murky water this time around, but this morning there is green scum floating on the surface of the lake, mostly visible around the edges where it is piling up against the shore. I’ve posted a few pictures. I wondered if we’d be seeing another bloom after David Hodsdon reported several weeks ago the TP (Total Phosphorus) reading of 0.023 mg/l from the 8/12/2013 water test. That much phosphorus usually indicates a bloom is on the way or underway. David had reported an algae bloom back in late July so I thought at the time the bloom winding down, but it is clear now that it the algae die-off in early August was just a temporary condition. You can check out the water quality monitoring data going back a couple of years on the Clary Lake Water Monitoring Data page. Continue reading →

The latest lake water monitoring data shows that the water quality has improved considerably from levels seen this past summer. The secchi reading of 13.45′ shows the lake water is the clearest it has been for a few years. I attribute this change primarily to a large infusion of rain water earlier this month. The dissolved oxygen values at the surface and at 23 feet also show that the “fall turnover” has occurred. From late spring through the end of summer the water at the bottom of the lake are oxygen-deficient. Fall weather brings about a mixing of lake water.

FYI be advised that the buoys marking the ledges at the northwest end of the lake are gone. It turns out the 5 gallon jug I set had deteriorated from ultraviolet light and developed cracks, filled with water, and then sank in about a foot of water. The other marker that Brent Duncan set on the other end of the ledge went missing a few weeks ago. This late in the season it doesn’t make sense to replace them, so I pulled both anchors. The ledges are only covered by a couple of inches of water. They’re awash at 42″ below the top of the dam, as are a number of other rocks between the ledges and the shore. Careful out there.

There was a thick green scum driven up against my dock this morning by the gentle current flowing around the lake, it is the carcasses of the cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) that were blooming a few weeks ago. As they die they float to the surface and get driven towards the shore where they collect. Dying cyanobacteria also release various toxins into the water. In high enough concentrations these toxins can kill fish and other wildlife. It’s not that bad here on Clary Lake but it does make for an unpleasant if temporary condition.

This is the end of this algae bloom but I would not be surprised given the hot weather and excessively low water conditions to see another bloom later this fall- typically they’ve been appearing in September or early October.