It was another heavy year with the aquatic plants on the lake. Clean-up crews worked through October cutting, picking up shorelines and doing pile pick up. We have included a chart that shows the volume of aquatic plants taken out of the lake over the years and how these last few years compare to the previous high growth cycles.

The total volume of aquatic plants removed from the lake equates to 7,438.50 cubic yards. Below is a graph of the volumes of aquatic plant removal over the past 25 years. The tallest spikes are the combined volumes of all the methods of the districts removal operations (the harvesters, shore barges and pile pick up). As you can see 2013 was another heavy year for aquatic plant growth.

Aquatic Plant Harvesting Chart 1

Aquatic Plant Harvesting Chart 1

The 2013 Pewaukee Lake weed harvest and removal season concluded with the harvesting of 306.5 harvester loads, the shore removal of 616.5 loads, and the Monday and Friday pile pick-up of 118.5 transport loads, all primarily of Eurasian Milfoil. We removed a total of 240 dump truck loads and 23 trailer loads. Additionally, in a cooperative effort with the Village of Pewaukee, we dumped 23 transporter loads at the Village facilities during our lake wide pile pick-up. According to LPSD records thru 1988, and excluding the extraordinary weed year of 2012, this is the highest number of harvester and dump truck loads since 1990. This is the highest amount of shore removal to date.

This season saw a significant infestation of filamentous algae around the perimeter of the western basin that fortunately diminished as the summer progressed. The eastern basin saw a lessened weed mat in the Kopmeier and Parkside shorefront areas that was offset by a substantial mat off of Peterson and Woodland. To accommodate boat traffic, a channel was cut from the Peterson buoy line towards Bauer’s Island buoy line.

The majority of floating weeds this year were removed from the shores of Kopmeier, Parkside (which for our purposes includes Hillside Grove), Taylors Woods (which for our purposes extends from Taylors Bay to “sandy point”), Woodland, and Peterson. Harvesting was done most heavily in Peterson, Woodland, Kopmeier, Starky Bay, and Buena Vista.

Below is a summary of loads removed and full, or partial, days spent in specific areas. It’s important to note that equipment may begin on a shore line and weather, wind, or completion of the assignment will cause movement to another location, yet still appear as a “day”. Approximately 25 harvester loads from the channel cut off of Peterson is reflected in the Peterson total.

Summary of Harvester Loads for 2013

Summary of Harvester Loads for 2013

[January 2014 Newsletter]