Tuesday, July 21, 2009

From the president's desk

MLCI board president Bill Ferdinand has sent along the following interesting article, of interest to the lake community. See the whole story here.

The story describes the battle against invasives as just that - a war. It details some of the methods that are used to combat the weeds, bugs, and other critters and green things that aren't native to Maine lakes - and that are taking over in some places. A key weapon in the battle is volunteer monitoring and education efforts that help boaters understand why they need to check their boats before launching. Just a small piece of some invasive plants can infest an entire lake. Says a DEP environmental specialist quoted in the piece,
"It's not a huge stretch of the imagination to assume someone came in with that on a boat prop or attached to a trailer," Gregory said. "It's incredibly easy for that to happen."

This year the front line is a lake in the Belgrade Lakes - MLCI's new
neighborhood. The story of that pond's 'last resort' treatment is detailed
in the story. It's definitely worth a read.

1 comment:

  1. Pontoons from float planes could conceivably have a slip of milfoil, something awful that flies in to a lake from puddle jumping aircraft. Lakes hate lawns, improperty roadways, want vegetative buffers, plunge pools to slow the racing water to free it of nutrients, silt, soil erosion, contaminants.

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