Category: The Landing

I have placed a link to the “Final 2010 Interim Report on the Lake George Coliform Monitoring Program”. This is prepared by the Darrin Fresh Water Institute. This report summarizes their coliform tests throughout the 2010 season at a number of spots on Lake George.

“The Coliform Monitoring Program focuses on a series of locations that have shown chronically high levels of coliform bacteria in past years with routine surveillance sampling of other locations also included. For 2010, synoptic sampling of public bathing beaches on a two week basis is also included in the program. In addition to samples collected at the lake-shore, a series of samples are collected up the watershed by the Lake George Park Commission to locate and remediate specific sources of bacterial pollution.”

The locations in the town of Dresden that were sampled can be found on page 5 of the report.

In the email which accompanied this report, Mr. Lawrence Eichler of the Darrin Fresh Water Institute explains some of the heightened levels found at certain areas.

We collected additional samples in the south basin at Huddle Beach Brook and South Sawmill Bay Brook in Bolton. We have also collected samples with elevated bacterial levels in Lake George at East Brook at the outlet of Greens Pond. None of the FC/Enterococci ratios suggest a human source, however we will continue to monitor these location. The extensive wildlife populations present in wetland areas may account for bacteria present in these sites.

In the North Basin we collected additional samples at Cook Bay South Culvert, Temple Island Culvert, Stags Leap Brook, and Hearts Bay Culvert. A decaying goose carcass was removed from Stags Leap Brook and may account for the single elevated bacterial sample. A horse pasture is present in the drainage of the Hearts Bay Culvert, possibly accounting for the bacterial counts there. We will continue to monitor these sites and assist the Lake George Park Commission in on-site investigations at selected locations.

All beach samples continued to meet NYS DOH standards for contact recreation.

If you want to learn more about coliform levels in Lake George, read the entire report.

Scuba divers working for Lycott Environmental install barriers over a small milfoil bed off of Huletts.

This morning I took a short kayak ride out to some scuba divers who I spotted in the bay. It turns out they work for Lycott Environmental, a company that has been hired by the Lake George Park Commission to work on eradicating Eurasian water milfoil from the lake.

Eurasian water milfoil was accidently introduced to North America from Europe and spread westward into inland lakes primarily by boats and also by waterbirds. It is an invasive species in Lake George.

This particular bed had been worked on last year and has responded well.

“Last year we put a barrier down and this year almost all the milfoil is gone,” said one of the workers. “We see a little growth around the edges, but we hand harvested last week and now we’re adding some more barriers. We really see an improvement in this particular bed from last year.”

Here is a picture of a strand of milfoil, for those unfamiliar with what it looks like.

Thank you Lycott Environmental and Lake George Park Commission.

On Saturday, August 14 at 9:30am at the Huletts Landing Fire House, The Federation of Huletts Landing is presenting Joseph W. Zarzynski and a discussion about his documentary called “Wooden Bones: The Sunken Fleet of 1758”. Please see the attached press release and website (www.woodenbones.com) If you haven’t had a chance to get a copy of this DVD, you’ll want to!

Title: Anatomy of an Archaeology Documentary–“Wooden Bones: The Sunken Fleet of 1758”
Presenter: Joseph W. Zarzynski, Underwater Archaeologist (Bateaux Below, Inc.)

NEWS RELEASE—For Immediate Release

Lake George, NY Documentary Wins Film Festival Maritime Heritage Award

Bateaux Below, Inc., a not-for-profit group that studies historic shipwrecks in Lake George, NY, has announced that Gray’s Reef Ocean Film Festival in Savannah, Georgia has chosen “Wooden Bones—The Sunken Fleet of 1758” as one of their official film festival selections. Furthermore, the Lake George-related documentary is one of two joint winners of the film festival’s prestigious “Maritime Heritage Category” award. “Wooden Bones—The Sunken Fleet of 1758” is a 58 min. long DVD documentary (www.woodenbones.com), a Pepe Productions (Glens Falls, NY) and Bateaux Below (Wilton, NY) documentary collaboration. The DVD was released in May 2010. The Gray’s Reef Ocean Film Festival is September 17-19 at the Savannah College of Art and Design. The NOAA-sponsored film festival reports that 90 films were submitted and only 33 were selected for showing.

“Wooden Bones” examines Lake George’s Sunken Fleet of 1758 when the British deliberately sank over 260 warships to protect them over the winter of 1758-1759 from their enemy, the French. The documentary investigates the history and underwater archaeological study of the lake’s sunken bateau-class warships, a sunken 1960 sub built to photograph British shipwrecks, and a 1758-constructed military dock found in Lake George’s shallows. Glens Falls, NY documentary filmmaker Peter Pepe directed the DVD and underwater archaeologist Joseph W. Zarzynski of Wilton, NY wrote it. The award-winning documentary was four years in production. For more information on the documentary and to view the trailer, consult the web site: www.woodenbones.com