Water Column Fall 2012
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A Publication of the Maine Volunteer Lake Monitoring Program Vol. 17, No. 2 Provided free of charge to our monitors and affiliates Fall 2012 Inside: Welcome New Monitors . 8 Thank You Donors! . 10 2012 Annual Conference . 12 Lakes at the Tipping Point? . 14 VLMP Advisory Board . 16 Brackett Center News . 20 VLMP Mission Statement The Mission of the Maine Volunteer Lake Monitoring Program is to help protect Maine lakes through widespread citizen participation in the gathering and dissemination of credible scientific information pertaining to lake health. The VLMP trains, certifies and provides technical support to hundreds of volunteers who monitor a wide range of indicators of water quality, assess watershed health and function, and screen lakes for invasive aquatic plants and animals. In addition to being the primary source of lake data in the State of Maine, VLMP volunteers benefit their local lakes by playing key stewardship and leadership roles in their communities . What’s Inside President's Message . 2 President’s Lakeside Notes . 3 Littorally Speaking . 4 Quality Counts! . 6 2012 Interns . 7 Message Welcome New Monitors . 8 Thank You Donors! . 10 Mary Jane Dillingham 2012 Annual Conference . 12 President, VLMP Board of Directors Lakes at the Tipping Point? . 14 VLMP Advisory Board . 16 Passings . 18 Over the Tipping Point The VLMP and the DEP played Brackett Center Updates . 20 important roles in the water utilities’ e often don’t truly appreciate response. Without the data gathered Wthe value of what we have through the VLMP, we would be in until it’s gone. For reasons that are the position of not having sufficient not clear, one of Maine’s highest- historical information to analyze value lakes went over the tipping what had occurred. VLMP staff point this year, and is now in crisis. worked with the water district to inform the surrounding communities VLMP Staff Lake Auburn has been the drinking about the highly unusual event. I Scott Williams Executive Director water supply for Lewiston and have been a volunteer monitor for Roberta Hill Invasive Species Program Director Auburn for more than 100 years. Lake Auburn since I began my Jonnie Maloney Program Coordinator The lake has been considered employment with the water utility Christine Guerette Program Assistant to have above-average water Linda Bacon QA/QC Advisor (Maine DEP) many years ago, and I am incredibly quality, compared to other Maine grateful that my employers fully lakes, based on excellent Secchi Board of Directors support the monitoring efforts on Mary Jane Dillingham, President (Auburn) transparency, relatively low algae our lake. Bill Monagle, Vice President (Winthrop) growth, and high levels of dissolved Lew Wetzel, Treasurer (Casco) oxygen throughout the summer We are working with every Phoebe Hardesty, Secretary (New Gloucester) months, supporting a prized cold available tool to understand what Malcolm Burson (Portland) water fishery of trophy Salmon and is happening, and hopefully to George Cross (Sangerville) Togue (Lake Trout). Sibyl French (Raymond) find a set of solutions to save Lake Auburn from further decline. We Norton 'Buzz' Lamb (New Gloucester) But during the past several years, Gerry Nelson (Lovell) highly value our lake for supporting Matt Scott (Belgrade) algae growth has increased a healthy coldwater fishery and Clyde Walton (Fayette) measurably, especially Gloeotrichia pristine drinking water that requires echinulata, which has also been on relatively little treatment. Advisory Board the increase in other Maine lakes. Holly Ewing Peter Vaux (Chair) In 2011, the lake became anoxic C. Barre Hellquist Ken Wagner More than ever, I appreciate the Martha Kirkpatrick Pixie Williams (zero dissolved oxygen) just below work of more than a thousand VLMP David Littell the thermocline for more than 10 volunteers, who monitor several weeks, and a severe algal bloom hundred Maine lakes. But I worry Editorial Staff occurred in late summer. In 2012, that there are still so many lakes that Scott Williams Jonnie Maloney, Layout the scenario worsened. Once again, are not being monitored. I encourage Roberta Hill Christine Guerette an algae bloom occurred, and all of you to spread the word about dissolved oxygen levels plummeted the work of the VLMP, and ask for To Contact Us 24 Maple Hill Road so severely that many lake trout died. your help in recruiting additional Auburn, Maine 04210 The fish kill caught the attention it volunteer lake monitors, so that we 207-783-7733 deserved from agencies, the public can better understand and protect the [email protected] and the Press. This unprecedented legacy of Maine’s clear, clean lakes. www.MaineVolunteerLakeMonitors.org event stunned everyone! Funding for this newsletter is made possible by grants from the US Environmental Protection Agency and the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, through Section 319 of the Clean Water Act. Printed and mailed by Penmor Lithographers, Lewiston, ME 2 Lakeside Notes Maine’s Lakes Program: United We Stand! aine’s “Lakes Program” came into DEP and the University of Maine and Mbeing a little more than four decades other educational institutions began to ago, as the public increasingly became tackle the complex technical, social and aware of threats to our exceptionally clear, economic elements of long-term lake clean lakes. The growing concern for the management and protection. County By Scott Williams future of Maine lakes contributed to the Soil and Water Conservation Districts VLMP Executive Director formation of three statewide entities that developed programs to address lake spirit, resulting in a powerful, cohesive continue to play key roles in the effort to watershed assessment and protection; and sustainable force. ensure that our lakes will remain among the Cobbossee Watershed District was the healthiest in the nation. The Maine formed in response to declining lake water But the world is changing in many Department of Environmental Protection, quality in a group of lakes near Augusta, ways. In recent years, the tight economy the Congress of Lake Associations, and and water utilities that withdraw public has created an environment that seems the Maine Volunteer Lake Monitoring drinking water from lakes recognized the to favor competition for dwindling Program, were then, as they are today, value of maintaining clean lakes. resources over collaboration and the backbone of the statewide effort to cooperation Despite this, and despite During the past four decades, Maine’s . sustain the health of our lakes. Each our collective and individual challenges, lakes program has been further enriched organization brings something unique to I sincerely believe that there could be through the formation of many lake the table, and together we have created a no better time for us to hold our course. and watershed associations. Lakes public/private partnership that is the envy Indeed, if we are wise, we will actually Environmental Association was among of many of our counterparts across North find ways to use these challenges to our the first, followed later by such groups as America: one that encompasses broad advantage, to strengthen and build upon Rangeley Lakes Heritage Trust, Raymond technical expertise, regulatory authority, our collaborative ties. If we do this, I Waterways Protective Association, and stakeholder advocacy, vibrant volunteer am confident that we will not only find 30-Mile River Watershed Association. service, and diverse sources of funding new efficiencies through the sharing of and program support. Maine’s lakes program has become living resources, knowledge, experience and technology that will get us through these Over the decades since these three proof of the wisdom of Aristotle’s claim challenging times, but we will also create entities were formed, a number of that “The whole is greater than the sum a more resilient, more successful and additional lake-focused programs have of its parts.” All of the individual parts of more hopeful lakes community. United come into being. Researchers at the Maine’s “lakes community” have worked in concert, with a strong collaborative we stand! Attention Lake Monitors: Are You Worried About Being Replaced by a Satellite? Recently, we have heard from a few volunteer taking Secchi disk (and other) readings on site at monitors who have wondered if information about your lake. lakes obtained through satellite imagery might render their work unnecessary or obsolete. The Researcher Ian McCullough, who has worked with unequivocal answer to this question is NO! satellite data for Maine lakes during the past few years, made this point clearly in a presentation on Satellite imagery data will enable us to gather the topic at the VLMP Annual Conference in July. information on lakes that are currently not For more information on Ian’s presentation, click being monitored because of inaccessibility on the following link from the VLMP website: and other reasons. It also enhances the information that you gather on the water. http://www.mainevlmp.org/wp/?page_id=150#Satellite But satellites must be calibrated, or “ground truthed”, which can only be accomplished by 3 Littorally Speaking VLMP’s Invasive Plant Patrol (IPP) Sustainability Initiative ~ How Are We Doing? e have said it before . When of the ‘new and improved’ IPP structure Wthe VLMP achieves its ultimate are now in place, and the result is a goal as an organization, virtually every system that encourages, supports and lake in the State of Maine will have celebrates