While it doesn’t appear quite as severe as last fall (at least not yet), this fall’s cyanobacteria algal bloom is gathering steam. This is not wholly unexpected: our last lake transparency reading was only 2.7 meters (8.8 feet) and there was quite a bit of green algae in suspension (see 2023 Water Quality Monitoring Season Comes to a Close) so I’m not really surprised to see this. The picture at left was sent to me yesterday afternoon by Danny Bell. Quite a shot! Apparently the aquatic growth helped keep the algae from drifting off. I went down to my shoreline and found only a thin greenish sheen of algae on the surface- nothing to compare with what Danny was seeing. The blue-green bacteria dies and floats to the surface where it’s moved around by wind and currents and in some places you’ll see quite a bit of green and in others much less or even none.  Last year the bloom continued into early December. Hopefully this one will burn itself out soon. I will be sending a sample into DEP for testing.

This picture was sent to my wife this morning by Fran Marsh who was understandably concerned.

Please send me your observations and pictures!