A good brisk morning to you LSC.

We'd like to do a quick recap of the floating weed cleanup efforts in the Channel & Little Lake this summer, say a few thank yous, and talk about keeping these efforts going next season.

In early July, as part of our milfoil control efforts, the LSCA and LSCCF announced that they had been planning for a 'Community Day' in the Channel and Little Lake areas to organize volunteers to collect all the floating milfoil they can find as an educational and hands-on 'Stop The Spread' event. Lake neighbors in the Channel informed us that they would like this effort to continue for the whole season, so arrangements were made to make this happen.

As we know, floating milfoil fragments will seed new plants - so it's very important to remove them from the lake. We also worked to educate residents on how they could help to 'Stop The Spread':

1. As a general rule, get as much milfoil out of the lake as possible. Let it dry out on land and dispose of it as you would yard waste.
2. Don’t drive through milfoil patches with your boat which will create fragments which can float away and seed new plants.
3. If you have milfoil on your prop, don’t just reverse and drive away, please remove it from the lake.
4. If you have milfoil growing in your dock or swimming area, pull it out by the roots and remove it from the lake.
5. If you see milfoil floating anywhere in the lake, near your dock, or along your shoreline, remove it from the lake.
6. Obey boating regulations by travelling at no-wake, 5 MPH speeds within 200’ of the shoreline.

Two weed drop-off points were set up, one in the Channel, and one in Little Lake. Volunteers were asked to scoop up and collect detached floating weeds and deposit them at one of the two drop-off points so they could be collected for disposal.

The kickoff event took place on Sunday, July 25th. That morning, volunteers from all around the lake came down to participate, filling up both drop-off points with weeds:

Drop-off point in the Channel

Drop-off point in Little Lake

Later that day, the LSCA's diver assisted suction harvesting (DASH) crew filled 21 buckets (17.5 gallon) full of weeds to haul away!

We are happy to report that these efforts continued throughout the season! Channel & Little Lake residents kept at it by loading up the drop-off points with weeds, and assisting the LSCCF's harvesting crew as they made regular pickups.

We have a lot of folks to thank for helping to make this project as success.

A sincere thank you to:

• Heather from West Lake Road for loaning her float to be used as a drop-off point in the channel - her float was returned last weekend
• Dawn and Joel for allowing the float to be anchored in front of their camp
• Karla and Mike for allowing their dock in the Little Lake to be used as a drop-off point
• The LSCA's DASH crew, Owen & Beck for the initial pickup on Community Day
• The LSCCF's harvesting crew for the subsequent pickups through the Summer
• The volunteers from Community Day, and the volunteers and Channel & Little Lake residents that worked all throughout the season to collect the weeds

This project was very successful, and we hope to continue, and expand it next year by starting it much earlier in the season.

If you can help by donating or loaning a float next season, please contact us at info@lakestcatherine.org.

We are very happy with our lake-wide milfoil control efforts for 2021, and we hope you are too. Our DASH team did great work again this year (read about that here), and year one of the 3-year milfoil control plan for Little Lake yielded excellent results. You can check out 'before' and 'after' drone photos by clicking those links (thank you to VT Lake House for taking these photos!).

Next Spring, we'll be reaching out to the lake community for donations to help fund year 2 of the plan which will be developed over the Winter and early Spring. We hope we can earn your support for the plan. You can read more about the 3-year plan and our 2021 fundraising efforts here: https://lakestcatherine.org/little-lake-milfoil-control

Soon, a comprehensive lake-wide aquatic plant survey will take place, and we'll have a full report to share with you in early November. 

Thanks again to everyone working hard and participating in this lake-wide Milfoil Control Program. Our collective efforts are making a significant and measurable difference in the milfoil level of Lake St. Catherine!

Let's all plan on working even harder next year!

Thank you!

We hope you find our Milfoil Control efforts worthy and we can earn your support - are you a member for 2021? Maintaining the lake costs approximately $125,000 annually. Grants, membership dues and contributions make up the majority of our funding. If you'd like to help, please consider becoming a member or making a donation. The LSCA is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit organization and any contribution that you make may be tax deductible.