By Kate Hill
Staff Writer
On Dec. 15, the Cazenovia Lake Association (CLA) held its monthly board of directors meeting via Zoom to provide the community with up-to-date information regarding the health of the lake, the organization’s goals and ongoing projects, and other relevant topics.
The non-profit volunteer organization is made up of residents, homeowners, business owners, and elected officials who strive to protect the environmental and recreational sustainability of Cazenovia Lake. The organization frequently partners with a number of local stakeholders, including businesses, town and village boards, SUNY ESF, Cazenovia College, and Cazenovia High School.
The December meeting included four presentations on topics of public interest.
Financial update
Vice President Sam Woods started off the information session with an overview of the CLA’s finances.
He provided the following information:
- Current CLA balance: $185,000
- Balance following 2019 lake treatment: $50,000
- Balance at the start of 2020: $66,850
- CLA contribution to 2019 Renovate lake treatment: $219,000
- CLA non-treatment yearly expenses (advertising, credit card fees, insurance, fundraising, postage/supplies, recording secretary YTD, tax prep, lake buoy installation): ~$8,500
Woods also highlighted the Town of Cazenovia’s support of the lake’s health, noting that the town’s contribution to the 2019 lake treatment was $32,000, and that it also funds other important pursuits, such as weed harvesting, watershed protection, research, and the approval process for a potential new herbicide, which required a $11,000 snail impact study.
“[The town’s] contribution to chemical treatment is probably going to be down to $15,000 [this year], but there are a lot of other things they contribute to,” Woods said.
ProcellaCOR EC
Lake health committee member Rich Husted discussed the potential use of ProcellaCOR EC for the chemical treatment of Eurasian watermilfoil in Cazenovia Lake.
The invasive plant, which has become increasingly abundant, degrades the lake’s water quality, aesthetic value and recreational potential.
According to Husted, Eurasian watermilfoil was introduced to the lake in the late 1980s and weed harvesting began in the 1990s.
“We got to the point where one harvester wasn’t enough to keep the lake enjoyable; it’ sort of like grass, the more you cut it the faster it grows,” Husted said. “In 2008, the lake association learned of a recently-approved herbicide [that] selectively attacks the milfoil without harming the native weeds.”
The north end of lake was treated using the new chemical, Trichlopyr — sold under the brand name “Renovate” — in 2009, and the south end was treated in 2010. It has since been treated every other year, except for 2016.
The cost of treatment ranges from $200,000 and $250,000, depending on the total acreage treated.
The CLA is planning to use a new herbicide, ProcellaCOR EC, in spring 2021 to treat certain portions of the lake demonstrating an increased presence and proliferation of Eurasian watermilfoil.
According to Husted, ProcellaCOR EC is superior to Renovate because it is better absorbed by the milfoil, it is more environmentally friendly, and it has lower long-term costs.
“We would need to treat the lake once every three years, instead of every two years with Renovate,” Husted said. “The treatment cost is approximately $250,000. However, because we only have to treat every three years, we will save approximately $250,000 over a six year period of time, or roughly a little over $42,000 a year.”
Switching to ProcellaCOR EC requires approval, licenses and permits from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC).
An important aspect of the approval process is ESF’s investigation into the impact of the chemical on the Chittenango ovate amber snail (COAS) population at Chittenango Falls.
The COAS is an endemic terrestrial snail only known from a single location in Chittenango State Park.
“The preliminary results of the [snail] study look favorable, and we are cautiously optimistic of its approval,” said Husted.
The five-year plan
President Dave Miller presented the CLA’s five-year plan and highlighted some current projects.
“Five years is just a number,” said Miller. “This is a forever continuum. We figured if we could take the next five years and have some projects and some goals that would be a good start. After three years, we will extend it another five years, or whatever it needs.”
According to Miller, the goals of the five-year plan are to reduce the nutrients, sediments and contaminants entering the lake in order to prevent premature aging; to help maintain the lake’s health for everyone to enjoy; to better educate the community in order to encourage personal investment in the health of the lake; and to maintain an effective “community-friendly” fundraising program.
In an effort to achieve its goals, the CLA worked with the Town and Village of Cazenovia to identify a number of projects for the next several years.
The project list includes a CLA-ESF partnership, a beach water quality and monitoring initiative, a water-sampling program, a silt reduction program, a milfoil treatment improvement program, a Harmful Algal Bloom (HAB) monitoring program, and a community outreach program.
Miller highlighted four of the initiatives, starting with the CLA-ESF partnership.
Through the partnership, ESF is utilizing Cazenovia Lake as its subject for ongoing projects relating to HAB mitigation.
“At the last lake summit, Dr. Greg Boyer — who is a world renowned HAB expert who works at ESF — came up to me and said, ‘Hey, would you guys like to collaborate, because Caz Lake would be a great place for me to do some of my research.’ Of course we said absolutely,” Miller said.
The initial projects include a boat survey to investigate septic leaching and phosphorus “hot spots” around the lake; a temperature buoy system for continuously tracking lake stratification for the purpose of HAB research; and the installation of a HydroVu water quality measurement instrument at Willow Bank Yacht Club to measure temperature, turbidity, conductivity, chlorophyll and cyanobacteria.
According to Miller, the hope is that the dock-mounted water monitoring system will potentially provide for a pre-HAB warning system.
“Ultimately, if it does work, we can install a number of these around the lake . . .” he said. “We would be notified via text message that ‘Hey, there is a water quality problem over in this location, go look.’”
Miller next discussed the CLA’s water-sampling program, which began this past summer.
The goal of the initiative is to create a database in order to detect changes in water quality over time that could serve as early indicators of a potential problem.
The lake is sampled three times a year in three different locations.
“We are having Cornell look at zooplankton, and we are having the phytoplankton looked at by a company that has been recommended to us by ESF . . .” Miller said. “For the invertebrates, we are taking a scoop of the sediment itself; we send those to Cooper Labs and they do an analysis of what those critters actually are.”
The CLA’s silt reduction program is focused on identifying key inflow areas to the lake and then working to address the problems.
According to Miller, the plan is to look at five to seven major inflow areas, to research the technology and costs associated with a sediment reduction system, and then to work with the Town and Village of Cazenovia, Cazenovia College, and a Local Waterfront Revitalization Program team to secure the necessary funding and implement a solution.
HAB monitoring
Lake health committee member Bob Crichton delivered the final presentation, which centered on the CLA’s HAB monitoring program.
Crichton began by explaining that most HABs are blue-green algae (BGA), which have been present in Cazenovia Lake for about a decade.
BGA are not actually algae at all, but are instead highly evolved types of bacteria called Cyanobacteria.
While not all of the 21 known types of BGA in Central New York are harmful, some can contain liver toxins and neurotoxins.
CLA launched its HAB monitoring program last year.
According to Crichton, the goal of the initiative is to help improve the safety of the people and pets that use the lake; to support the Lakeland Park swimming area operations; to gain a better understanding of when and why blooms occur; to reduce the amount of time required to determine if a HAB is present; and to facilitate better overall communication about whether or not the lake is safe for recreation.
From May through September, CLA members conduct weekly lake inspections and provide any suspicious samples to ESF for analysis and identification.
“We are trying to build a database to start to understand when [HABs] happen and what the conditions are [that cause them],” Crichton said. “Eventually, the goal is to start to eliminate these [conditions] through other techniques that may become available.”
The CLA members also perform regular visual inspections of the milfoil situation.
Crichton advised community members to notify the CLA if a potential bloom is detected. A CLA member will arrive at the scene to take a photo and sample of the water.
“We then take the sample back to our homes, put it under a microscope, digitize it, and then send it off to ESF for [analysis, identification and risk assessment]” Crichton said.
If the sample is identified as a high-risk bloom, ESF will analyze the abundance and toxicity of the Cyanobacteria. Positive HAB results are communicated to various agencies and stakeholders, including the CLA constituents.
Crichton concluded his presentation with a report on the 2020 HAB monitoring program results.
He described the overall water quality as “quite good,” noting that there were very limited blooms between May and August, and that although there were several BGA blooms between mid-September and October, only two samples contained HABs.
For more information on the CLA, visit cazlake.org or email [email protected].
Donations can be made at cazlake.org/donate.
