What's up with that?

[KTO]

There are three places that I am curious about:

1) What's up with middle ground shoal? Has anyone explored inside there. What is up with that? How did it become (Probably millions of years ago)

2) The sandbar in front of the Patrician Shores/Sands of Brookhurst.. . How did that get there? It's really weird and really random! Could it be that there are two streams from land that carried the sand out there? And why isn't it marked better? There are only marker bouys on the outer side of the sandbar, we see people hit from our dock at least once a week.

3) Finally, the Witches, are they just random rocks that just HAPPEN to be sticking outta the water? Is there a shoal around the rocks? Has anyone dived or snorkeled around these rocks? Is this a good site to see underwater?

Thanks for any replies?
________
Honda DN-01

[Dave R]

From what I gather, "The Witches" was an island but at some point in the past a dam was built and the water level was raised. This put much of the island underwater and erosion over the years got rid of the soil leaving nothing but rock. Supposedly, In the 1800s there were trees on the Witches.

No clue about the middle ground shoals but if you took a close look at any 72 square mile section of land in NH, you'd likely find huge variations in soil, rock, hills, plains etc. so finding such dramatic variations under 72 square miles of water should not be too difficult. I'd love to see what the lake would look like empty but I would not want the lake emptied... I intend to take my kids snorkeling around those shoals, and others, when they get older. There's a shoal off the south end of Rattlesnake Island that intrigues me too. I imagine the snorkeling around Moose and Ship Islands is interesting.

I would guess the sand is indeed an indication of a water flowing to that area at a decent rate and then slowing at some point in the past. I bet there's huge amounts of sand under the muck on the bottom of the lake.

[Winnipesaukee Divers]

Keep in mind that Lake Winnipesaukee is actually 9 separate lakes joined together by a common dam in Lakeport. This dam raised the lake level by 18 feet; any of these shoals area was above the water level before 1822 and therefore islands.

I have dove each of these spots over the years and I can tell you what down there... Rocks, rocks and more rocks of all sizes but most are 3-6 feet or larger in diameter with jacked edges, like they were crushed. One would suppose that; they were formed by the glaciers as they move through the area thousands of years ago. However, what's more interesting is the shoals are just off the north western and south eastern tips of Rattlesnake and appears again just north of Pumpkin point and just off Sandy point in Alton Bay, these areas are comprised of small round rocks kinda like what you'd find in a river bed. These areas just don't make any since at all, especially the one on the north side of Rattlesnake Island it must be at least a 100' high in a cone shape.

The rocks off Ship Island are huge 10 to 20 feet in diameter and some have perfectly smooth sides. I in vision they were blasted out of the extinct volcano that is now the Ossipee Mountain range. When I go down to the floor of the lake in this area I find huge deposits of basalt (lava), which these rock are laying on, that form many of the islands.

My conclusion was the glacier came through the area first grinding up the stones forming these gravel piles. Some time later the Ossipee volcano blew it top showering the area with the jagged boulders forming the islands amd shoal areas... How else could it have happen, they are too deep to have created by normal weather erosion?

See what happens when you spend altogether too much time exploring the bottom. You spend to much time thinking about how did these get down here?

BTW: most of the sandy areas in the lake, the sand is only a foot or so deep under that is clay....

[SIKSUKR]

I not sure of the exact geological sequence of our piece of the world but this I am pretty sure:The mountains in New England are one of the oldest mountain ranges in the world.They were at one time the tallest in the world.These two things being true,a lot has happened to them and there must be more than a few scenarios as to why what remains here.Great stuff to comtemplate. SS

[Mee-n-Mac]

Originally Posted by KTO

{snip}
2) The sandbar in front of the Patrician Shores/Sands of Brookhurst.. . How did that get there? It's really weird and really random! Could it be that there are two streams from land that carried the sand out there? And why isn't it marked better? There are only marker bouys on the outer side of the sandbar, we see people hit from our dock at least once a week.
{snip}
Thanks for any replies?

I'm not sure what sandbar you're reffering to. The sandbar I know is between the communities and I don't recall any markers for it. So far as I can recall there has only ever been the 1 stream btw Patrician Shores and Brookhurst (and I'm going back to when there wasn't a Patrician Shores house* in that area). Even then the sandbar would shift depth and position as a function of the water carried out from the stream. Big rainstorms would make some pretty dramatic changes. Used to be a lot of frogs (to feed to the bass) in that stream too ! I have to say I haven't ventured out and about the sandbar in recernt years so I can't say if it's changed much since I was a kid at Brookhurst. Next time I visit the parental units I'll have to check it out.

The black markers that are out from Brookhurst mark some nice rock formations. We used to watch the cruisers leave the Farrar Pt beach and there was always 1 a season that would cut btw the markers and not make it. At the other side of the quadrangle the red (you can't tell their color until you're on top of them they're so old) markers delimit some form of sandbar, not too many rocks there I thought. Don't know how this came to be.

*I have a vague memory that it used to be a seminary back when. Am I remembering this correctly ?

[mcdude]

I'm a little confused because I thought Brookhurst was in Alton (near Mt. Major)....must be another one in Meredith? Here may be a postcard of the seminary that Mee-n-Mac is referring to.....

[PROPELLER]

Siksukr, I remember reading (I think) that the Adirondack Mountains in NY are older than the White Mountains in NH & you can tell as a general rule because the Whites are more pointy at their peaks than the Adirondacks because they have not been exposed to the outdoor elements as long. The peaks & rocks of the Adirondacks are more worn from exposure to the weather.

[Rattlesnake Gal]

According to geologists, Rattlesnake Island is the edge of an extinct volcano, which is centered in the Belknaps. Duncan Press has a great topographical map that shows both extinct volcanoes in the Ossipees and the Belknaps.
Is the Weirs Channel deep enough to allow the lake to drop 18 feet? Are there any maps out there with Winnipesaukee split up into the smaller lakes?

[Winnipesaukee Divers]

You got me on that one: just where did the 9 lakes (make that the Winnipesaukee basin) drain? It had to flow down through the Wears Channel in order to get to the ocean before the dam was made, but how?

I seem to recall seeing some old pictures showing the Weirs channel before the bridge was there and it was allot wider. Perhaps they filled the area, so they wouldn't have to build such a big bridge. I don't know for sure but it seems logical... Look what they did in Boston's back bay about the same time frame... That must have been a tuff job as well.

What's your take on it? I’ll do a little more research; maybe we can settle this last piece of the puzzle…

A very interesting subject….

[mcdude]

I seem to recall reading that in the old, old prehistoric times that the lake emptied out through Alton Bay, down the Merrymeeting River and then the Ela River and into Great Bay near Portsmouth!

[Rattlesnake Gal]

I forgot to mention to Winnipesaukee Divers how much I enjoyed hearing about what is under the water in our beautiful lake. You paint a nice picture for those of us that have not been diving. Thanks!

[Mee-n-Mac]

Originally Posted by mcdude

I'm a little confused because I thought Brookhurst was in Alton (near Mt. Major)....must be another one in Meredith?

There may be another Brookhurst in Alton, I don't know. I do know that right on the Center Harbor/Meredith line sits the Sands of Brookhurst. It and Patrician Shores (likely on the site of the seminary your postcard depicts, thx for that one) are between Farrar Pt (coming out of Center Harbor) the point next to Leavitt Park (hmm, Leavitt Pt perhaps ?).

WD - Now I'm curious, what would the 9 lakes look like ? Is there any depiction of what they may have been ? Did these 9 lakes all have separate names ? I guess I could markup a present day lake chart and see what results. Paugus Bay/lake is obvious. I might guess the tip of Alton Bay past Sandy Pt would be separated and a lot of the present lake north of Moultonborough Bay but what else I wonder. Perhaps the whole of the lake north of Cow, Lil Bear & Long Is ?

[SIKSUKR]

Originally Posted by PROPELLER

Siksukr, I remember reading (I think) that the Adirondack Mountains in NY are older than the White Mountains in NH & you can tell as a general rule because the Whites are more pointy at their peaks than the Adirondacks because they have not been exposed to the outdoor elements as long. The peaks & rocks of the Adirondacks are more worn from exposure to the weather.

Propeller,you very well might be right,although Whiteface looks an awfull lot like the whites.I not sure there is a lot of difference in terms of geological significance between the whites and the adirondacks but I believe in general the northeast mountains along with the Appalacian chain are among the oldest in the world. SS

[PROPELLER]

Siksukr, I agree with you about Whiteface, it does look like what you would find in the White Mountains. I also believe you are correct about the mountains in the Northeast campared to say the Rockies out west. I believe the same principle I mentioned in my earlier post applies. The Rockies are larger, more pointy & rocky because they have not been exposed to the weather & elements as long as the mountains in the Northeast because they are younger.

[GWC...]

This is how a geologist views the Lake.

P.S.- You have to click on the northeast, then NH, then the Lake area to see the view. Have fun.

[madrasahs]

New England's geological history is pretty complex.

Much of the northeastern US' mountain features was formed by a collision with the continent of Africa about 350 million years ago. (Before the dinosaurs).

The Ossipee Mountain range is nearly a perfect ring of extinct volcanoes, and there were certainly other volcanos in the area.
At one time, Mt. Shaw was taller than Mt. Everest is today. (Everest gains a few inches every year). As previously posted, "new" mountian ranges (Rockies, Alps) are "pointy". "Old" mountain ranges (Appalachians, Adirondacks, White) are "rounded".

All of that changed with two great glacial events, the last melting away about 10,000 years ago. (Much later than the dinosaurs). Because the glaciers "tied up" so much water, sea levels were once much lower, so that the North American continent was accessable to migrants from Asia, and even Olde England could be walked to.

Glaciers were so wide and tall that their weight caused the earth to bend downward ("subsidence"). When they melted, scientists determined there was a rebound of the earth's surface. Cold temperatures in some of Europe's deepest caves are said to reflect the cold of their old glaciers.

"Our" glaciers pushed everything -- soil, trees, boulders -- all the way to the sea and helped to create (N.Y.'s) Long Island.

Some of the larger boulders around New Hampshire, called glacial erratics, probably retained enough solar heat to keep from moving too far at once. That great boulder in Madison, NH, is a glacial erratic, moved many miles from its mountain origin -- by glaciers.

Many of the "Necks" of Winnipesaukee are formed of dense clusters of smaller boulders and rocks left by the glaciers -- called "glacial moraine". (There's "glacial till", too, but I think that's the smaller stuff).

Much of what you see around you today has been produced by erosion: The mountains continue to erode from lightning strikes and freeze-cycles (and why you can get your shoes "sandy" high in New Hampshire peaks). The Old Man of the Mountain (who probably didn't always look like an Old Man) is part of that erosion. Our eroding mountains are "sand machines".

Much of the fertile nutrients in today's Lake Region soil has been produced by the leaves, wood, and needles of "just" 10,000 years of successive forests that grew "in the wake" of the glaciers' passing. (And why Native Americans only arrived "fairly recently" to take up residence here).

Today's intact lakeside forest is what keeps nutrients of the natural forests (and any other "added" nutrients) from washing directly into the lake -- alternately reducing clarity, and encouraging algae to grow.

[SAMIAM]

GWC..Thanks for that link...That was a lot of fun.......zoomed right in on my place.......the wife was out in the yard in her bikini!

[GWC...]

Good thing you did not zoom in on me. I was skinny dipping or should I say chunky dunking!

P.S.- Don't you just love it when the electricity goes out?! Love cooking breakfast on the barbie, any excuse to "pig-out" will do!