Larry Armstrong may have been first to notice something going terribly wrong on Waumegah Lake.
An avid ice fisherman, Armstrong carried his auger onto Waumegah the day after Thanksgiving.
By mid December, he was pulling in far fewer fish than usual.
‘I saw schools of perch, bluegill, pike and bass all swimming together, real slow,? Armstrong said. ‘They weren’t attacking each other or anything, just swimming around trying to find oxygen.?
He also saw bullheads’commonly known as catfish’swimming up into holes he’d drilled in the ice.
‘They’d poke their heads out of the hole and look at me,? Armstrong said, noting, bullheads characteristically stay close to the bottom and are tolerant of low oxygen levels.
‘I never saw anything like it. It took awhile before it dawned on me what was happening.?
By early January, the fish stopped biting all together and the anglers abandoned the lake.
Experts say the scene Armstrong observed is typical of a lake in the midst of winterkill’ice essentially seals the lake, one thing or another interferes with the normal process of photosynthesis, and fish die from a lack of oxygen.
Most often, the cause is natural.
‘When we have early and extensive snow cover, the sunlight can’t get through to cause photosynthesis with plants alive below the ice,? said Gary Towns, supervisor of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources? Lake Erie Watershed Management Unit. ‘And that’s what gives oxygen to the water. When you don’t have that for an extended period of time, the degradation of dead material in the bottom of the lake uses up available oxygen.
According to information issued by the DNR, shallow lakes with excess amounts of aquatic vegetation and mucky bottoms’like Waumegah’are prone to winterkills, which begin with distressed fish gasping for air at holes in the ice, and end with large numbers of dead fish.
But in a winterkill, the DNR says, fish actually die in late winter.
Not so the case with Waumegah.
‘None of the many thousands of dead fish we saw today were under the ice,? said Bistoff before last week’s warm temperatures and high winds opened up a large part of the lake. ‘Instead, they were near the top of the remaining ice with several inches of ice underneath; many more dead fish were on the surface of the remaining ice.?
In other words, he explained, the fish were dead before the ice even finished forming.
‘This fish kill was not a product of a long, hard winter,? he said, ‘The fish in Waumegah Lake died within 30 days of the lake freezing over.?
Bistoff and many of his neighbors are frustrated, and say the Waumegah Lake Improvement Board (WLIB) has long acted without regard to resident concerns.
But when the new augmentation well began operating in 2005, Bistoff said, the real trouble began; increased amounts of phosphorus washed into the lake from shoreline flooding and erosion; groundwater from the well added iron to the lake; and wetlands’which protected the lake by filtering and consuming excess nutrients’were swallowed.
The changes, Bistoff contends, caused an explosion of aquatic plant growth and algae blooms.
But, he points out, he’s not just hypothesizing.
A water quality analysis completed in 2004 by Jeffrey Holler, a certified lake manager, showed decreasing dissolved oxygen levels because of decaying poisoned plants on the lake bottom. The study warned of a fish kill if large-scale poisoning of aquatic plants continued.
But in 2007, the lake board more than doubled the annual assessment for aquatic plant control from $260.71 to $555.55 and treated the lake with herbicides, not just in May or early June, as recommended, but also on July 23.
The treatments disregard the fish kill warning, Bistoff said, and also flew in the face of a previous study commissioned by the WLIB.
In 2001, the board retained Progressive AE, a consulting firm based in Grand Rapids, to define a nuisance aquatic plant control program.
‘It is recommended that the plant control program for Waumegah Lake include a combination of herbicide treatments and mechanical harvesting,? the final recommendations read. ‘Harvesting vegetation from Waumegah will prove beneficial over the long term (by slowing) the rate in which organic sediment accumulates on the lake bottom. Herbicide treatments are generally most effective…early in the growing season’May or early June’and harvesting is generally conducted later in the growing season’July’after Eurasian milfoil has been controlled with herbicides.?
But a significant herbicide treatments took place through July 23, while mechanical harvesting in 2008, according to records submitted to the township by the WLIB, was limited to two cuttings of lily pads in the shallow fringe areas of the lake.
By winter, according to ice fisherman Larry Armstrong, no living vegetation could be spotted in Waumegah Lake, while poisoned plants rotted on the lake bottom.
Waumegah was ripe for a fish kill, Bistoff said.
‘Great numbers of fish’from juveniles to large adults? were concentrated in small areas when they died,? he said. ‘Under normal conditions, that would never be the case; but, under oxygen-deprived conditions, fish of all sizes congregate wherever they can find any remaining oxygen. Unfortunately, if they consume that oxygen they all die together in large groups.?
Which, the evidence shows, they did.
‘I think it’s a reasonable interpretation,? said John Freeland, Ph.D., a Professional Wetlands Scientist with Environmental Consulting and Technology in Ann Arbor. ‘I think that it somewhat speculative, but I think it makes sense from an ecological standpoint.?
Some 1,400 lakes exist in Oakland County, according to the Oakland County Drain Commission. Of those, two lakes’Waumegah and Eagle Lake in Waterford’have thus far reported a fish kill. Both are shallow and according to reports, Eagle Lake also underwent a late-season treatment.
Two other untreated lakes in the state also reported a fish kill, according to the DNR.
‘Waumegah Lake has a lot of vegetation and it’s shallow,? said Freeland. ‘It warms up quite a bit in the summer. Those types of lakes are common in Oakland County, and I think that the best you can do is look at other lakes and how those lakes were managed, and make some comparisons.?
But the MDEQ, while acknowledging the chemical treatment may have been a contributing factor in the fish kill, said it was difficult to make a strong case, given the time frame of treatments. The agency also said it found no indication of permit violations by the WLIB.
Also, an email forwarded to The Clarkston News by Springfield Township Supervisor and Waumegah Lake board member Mike Trout suggested the board was on track with its aggressive treatments.
‘With the exception of some of the water lilies (that) interfere with boat traffic, all of the target plants in Waumegah are exotic and invasive species,? wrote G. Douglas Pullman, Ph.D. of the Aquest Corporation. ‘The goal of the program is to suppress the production of these noxious species so that desirable native plant species can thrive and support the fishery and other critical parts of the ecosystem.? Failure to deal with these invaders will result in the loss of ecosystem stability and key features that people consider to be desirable for recreation.? It would be similar to failing to deal with a persistent infection in humans.?
But whatever the case, neighbors understand there’s no undoing the fish kill.
‘We want other people to know about this so it doesn’t happen at other lakes,? said Larry Armstrong.
Bistoff agreed, noting he also hopes the board will begin to follow recommendations of the 2002 study.
‘I think Mr. Bistoff is great for bringing this to everyone’s attention,? said Gary Towns, DNR. ‘I think trying to make shallow lakes into all-sports lakes is always going to be an uphill battle. It puts the environment at risk when you try to change it from what it is.?