Summer Environmental Notes

 

Our annual Forest Health Workshop was held at the township offices on August 23^rd.

As in the past the presentation was made by Bioforest Technologies, and all in attendance agreed that it was exceptional.

 

We were very pleased to learn that both the gypsy moth and the forest tent caterpillar activity seems to quite moderate this year.  And the pest that we have been the most concerned about of late, the hemlock looper seems to be in remission.  Bioforest technicians were not able to detect any looper activity at all.  We hope that this will be confirmed when the moth traps are examined in a few weeks.  This would be extremely good news in as much as the hemlock looper has a cycle of 20-30 years.

 

We are quite pleased with the bacterial levels in the South Channel area.  In 2004 levels of both E. coli and total coliforms were lower than they were in the previous year. However, as has been the case over the previous 3 or 4 years, in 2004 we found extremely high levels of total coliforms in most areas from late July to early September.  This was due to still undetermined natural causes.

 

To date in 2005 we have completed 6 samplings.  The E. coli and total coliforms levels have been the lowest that we have seen for this period in the 7 years that we have participated in the water quality monitoring program.  This was a surprise to us because the water temperatures are the highest that we have seen, ever, several degrees above the average.  In fact, it is likely that we will see an all time high for the annual mean high lake temperature.  We have concluded that the weeks of cloudless weather and extremely high UV ratings kept our bacterial counts relatively low.  Also the lack of rain this so far this season has resulted in a near total lack of runoff water.

 

The bacterial readings for the years 2003 and 2004 as well as all of readings to date for 2005 are now available on line, and for the remainder of the year these readings will be updated within a day or two of the samples being taken.

 

Click on www.southchannel.org for water monitoring results and much other useful information in relation to the South Channel.  This web site, by the way, is very user friendly.  We are still under construction, but we hope to become a one stop source of information and interesting things in and about the South Channel.

 

 

                                                                                                Stan Topping