How's Winnipesaukee's Water Quality?

[ushaggerb]

Originally Posted by Lakegeezer

The presentation from the 7/21 seminar is online at http://www.winnipesaukee.org/wp-cont...ty-7-21-18.pdf

You can also see the water quality measurements at http://winnipesaukeegateway.org/moni...ing-sites-map/

As a water tester for 7 years, my opinion is that the water quality is improving. Some of that is due to dry weather, but I think public education and shoreline protection laws are slowly having an impact.

While I am mindful that tampering with nature has it pitfalls, I have to ask: is there anything that can be added to the Lake, perhaps at the source, that can combat the negative mentioned throughout the posts?

[FlyingScot]

Originally Posted by ushaggerb

While I am mindful that tampering with nature has it pitfalls, I have to ask: is there anything that can be added to the Lake, perhaps at the source, that can combat the negative mentioned throughout the posts?

Even if the chemistry was available, the problem is too vast for chemical treatment. The issues identified are largely driven by phosphorous and nitrogen flowing into the lake from over a thousand locations. Basically, the lake is the bottom of a bowl, and all the phosphorous and nitrogen coming down the sides of the bowl land in Winni. The phosphorous is naturally occurring, but development increases phosphorous flow by up to 10X. Fertilizer, septic, rainwater from roadways, houses, and lack of plants near shoreline all play a role.

The good news though is that the lake turns over 20% of its water each year. If we can reduce the phosphorous flow into the lake by mitigating the problems above, the flushing of the lake will bring our count down over time.

The primary goal of the Lake Winnipesaukee Association is to identify all of these sources of phosphorous and identify action plans to mitigate the flow.

[Merrymeeting]

http://www.nhpr.org/post/fish-game-m...state-hatchery