Water Chemistry of Lakes Southwest Florida Water Management District
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Water Chemistry of Lakes in the Southwest Florida Water Management District Kenneth Romie Environmental Section Resource Management Department Southwest Florida Water Management District February 2000 Acknowledgments This report was made possible by the invaluable contribution of all those that helped with every aspect of study. They included: Data Collection Water Chemistry Analysis Quincy Wylupek Mark Rials Keith Kolasa Jackie Hohman Philip Rhinesmith Bonnie Gering David Carr Gerry Hall Lisa Henningsen John Boutin Richard Gant Matt Jablonski Marcella Robinson Addys Cortes Matthew Dooris Ying Wu Sid Flannery Lynn Olsen Craig Dye Scott McDermott Mark Kehoe Jason Hood Mark Hurst Michael Carta Forrest Sackey GIS Data and Analysis Lonnie Lewis Phil Jackson Cover Art and Photography Richard Gant i Table of Contents Acknowledgments ........................................................... i Table of Contents ............................................................ ii List of Tables ............................................................... iii List of Figures .............................................................. iv Introduction ................................................................ 1 Site Selection ............................................................... 2 Sampling Methods ........................................................... 3 Data Analysis ............................................................... 3 Data Summary .............................................................. 4 Percentile Distributions of Water Chemistry for the Sampled Lakes .................... 5 Ionic Compositions of the Sampled Lakes ........................................ 7 Water Chemistry and Soils .................................................... 8 Water Chemistry and Land Use ................................................. 10 Water Chemistry and Florida Lake Region ........................................ 11 Literature Cited ............................................................. 59 Appendix A. List of Lakes Sampled in the Southwest Florida Water Management District ............................................. 62 Appendix B. Plots Depicting the Water Chemistry Sample Distributions for Lakes Sampled in the Southwest Florida Water Management District ............................................. 70 Appendix C. Lake Water Chemistry vs. Soil Series, for 323 Sampled Lakes in the Southwest Florida Water Management District ......................... 83 ii Appendix D. Lake Water Chemistry vs. Land Use, for 323 Sampled Lakes in the Southwest Florida Water Management District .........................104 Appendix E. Data Summary Sheets for Lakes Sampled in the Southwest Florida Water Management District. .................................125 a. Interpretaion of Water Chemistry Measures ........................126 b. Interpretation of Lake Data Sheets ................................128 b. Interpretation of Water Chemistry and Lake Surface Elevation Plots .....129 c. Data summary sheets ...........................................129 iii List of Tables Table 1. Locations of the original (1992-1995) Ambient Monitoring Program water bodies and stations ...................................................... 14 Table 2(a). Distribution of sampled lakes by county, for all lakes in the SWFWMD; 2(b), distribution of sampled lakes by county, for all named lakes in the SWFWMD ....................................................... 15 Table 3. Water Chemistry Parameters, Units, Detection Limits, and Analytical Methods Used .............................................................. 16 Table 4. Summary of Water Chemistry for all Sample Lakes ......................... 17 Table 5. Summary of Nuisance Vegetation in the Sampled Lakes. ..................... 18 Table 6. Dominant Ions in the sampled lakes, determined from concentrations, percent meq/L .............................................................. 19 Table 7. Dominant ions in the sampled lakes, by Florida lake region ................... 20 Table 8. A description of the soil orders .......................................... 21 Table 9. Summary of soil orders present in the 500 meter buffer areas around the sample lakes (n=323) ................................................ 22 Table 10. Summary of soil chemistry data, from soil data for soils within the SWFWMD bounds ........................................................ 23 Table 11. Spearman rank correlation coefficients for soil order with median lake water chemistry variables .................................................. 24 Table 12. Spearman rank correlation coefficients for major land use classifications with median lake water chemistry variables ....................................... 25 Table 13. Summary of relative lake water chemistry by Florida Lake Region ............. 26 iv List of Figures Figure 1. Distribution of Florida trophic state index (FTSI) in the sample lakes ........... 27 Figure 2. Distribution of chlorophyll a in the sample lakes ........................... 28 Figure 3. Distribution of color in the sample lakes .................................. 29 Figure 4. Distribution of specific conductance in the sample lakes ..................... 30 Figure 5. Distribution of total hardness in the sample lakes ........................... 31 Figure 6. Distribution of pH in the sample lakes ................................... 32 Figure 7. Distribution of transparency (Secchi depth) in the sample lakes ................ 33 Figure 8. Distribution of total nitrogen in the sample lakes ........................... 34 Figure 9. Distribution of total alkalinity in the sample lakes .......................... 35 Figure 10. Distribution of total phosphorus in the sample lakes ....................... 36 Figure 11. Distribution of total suspended solids in the sample lakes ................... 37 Figure 12. Distribution of turbidity in the sample lakes .............................. 38 Figure 13. Prevalent chemical type of water in the 323 sample lakes ................... 39 Figure 14. Bar plot of sum of the major ions by lake water chemical type ............... 40 Figure 15. Bar plot of pH by lake water chemical type .............................. 41 Figure 16. top - Bar plot of soil total bases by soil order; bottom - Bar plot of soil cation exchange capacity by soil order ...................................... 42 Figure 17. top - Soil pH by soil order; bottom - Soil organic carbon content by soil order ................................................................ 43 Figure 18. top - Soil total phosphorus by soil order; bottom - Soil hydraulic conductivity by soil order ...................................................... 44 Figure 19. Plots of potassium by Alfisol soil order. The top plot is of raw values, the lower plot is of the ranked values of both potassium and Alfisol area ................ 45 v Figure 20. Plots of sodium by Entisol soil order. The top plot is of raw values, the lower plot is of the ranked values of both sodium and Entisol area .................. 46 Figure 21. Plots of color by Histosol soil order. The top plot is of raw values, the lower plot is of the ranked values of both color and Histosol area ................... 47 Figure 22. Plots of potassium and magnesium by grove type land use ................... 48 Figure 23. Plots of sulfate and total hardness by grove type land use ................... 49 Figure 24. Plots of specific conductance and nitrate by grove type land use .............. 50 Figure 25. Bubble plot depicting the interaction between grove land use and Entisol soil order and sample lake nitrate concentrations ............................. 51 Figure 26. Map of Florida Lake Regions in the Southwest Florida Water Management District ......................................................... 52 Figure 27. Box plots of turbidity and total suspended solids, vs. Florida Lake Region ...... 53 Figure 28. Box plots of total nitrogen and total phosphorus, vs. Florida Lake Region ...... 54 Figure 29. Box plots of pH and total alkalinity, vs. Florida Lake Region ................ 55 Figure 30. Box plots of chlorophyll a and Florida trophic state index, vs. Florida Lake Region ................................................................ 56 Figure 31. Box plots of nitrate and sulfate, vs. Florida Lake Region .................... 57 Figure 32. Box plots of conductivity and Secchi depth, vs. Florida Lake Region .......... 58 vi WATER CHEMISTRY OF LAKES IN THE SOUTHWEST FLORIDA WATER MANAGEMENT DISTRICT Introduction The Southwest Florida Water Management District (SWFWMD) began an ambient monitoring program for lakes in the District in January 1992. The objectives of the monitoring program were: 1) for early detection of water bodies with declining water quality trends, which might benefit from District or local government intervention; 2) to document changes in water chemistry that could be associated with the implementation of management strategies by the District or local governments; 3) to provide preliminary data for water bodies that may ultimately be included in the Surface Water Improvement and Management Program (SWIM) Priority Waterbody List; and 4), to establish a long-term database for water bodies representative of identifiable geographical and ecological regions that can be used for comparative purposes in other waterbody studies. During the first two years of the program, samples were collected quarterly from 20 stations in 16 lakes, mostly in Citrus and