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Alberta Lake Management Society
Phone: 780-702-ALMS
Fax: 501-423-6381
Address: P.O. Box 4283, Edmonton, Alberta, T6E 4T3
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Greetings!
Welcome to the Alberta Lake Management Society's December edition of "The New Wave". We hope you all have a very merry Christmas and we look forward to bringing you more great lake information in 2011! |
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A Message from the ALMS President
As we welcome the winter season, it is a good time to reflect on what a great year 2010 was for ALMS and update you on what we have in store in 2011.
Our Lakewatch program was a great success in 2010 and we were able to visit 25 lakes across Alberta. Our success in this program was largely due to critical partnerships including the Beaver River Watershed Alliance and its umbrella group the Lakeland Industry & Community Association, Alberta Environment, Alberta Tourism, Parks and Recreation, and the County of Wainwright. The BRWA partnership and funding allowed ALMS to sample Beaver, Touchwood, Skeleton N, Skeleton S, Minnie, Moose, Marie, Stoney, Laurier, and Crane Lakes in the Beaver River Basin (commonly known as the Lakeland Region). This long-term initiative will provide a good picture of regional water quality in that area and further details of this program can be found at www.beaverriverwatershed.ca. ALMS partnership with the County of Wainwright allowed sampling of Arm Lake in both 2009 and 2010. These relationships are great models for other lake groups who would like to develop a long-term lake monitoring program for their lakes. Again in 2010 ALMS partnered with Alberta Environment and Alberta Tourism, Parks and Recreation to monitor lakes within provincial parks. As well, and despite tight provincial budgets, Alberta Environment continued to fund sampling for an additional 10 lakes across the province. The donation is critical as it allows watershed groups and individuals in Alberta to monitor their lakes at zero cost.
The LakeWatch Program for 2010 would have not been nearly as successful without the support of AENV Staff in the McIntyre Building and Ron Zurawell, our great technicians Brad and Emily, and our 2010 Coordinator Jill Anderson! As well, a very special thanks goes out to the numerous volunteers and to the organizations that made for such a great sampling season. As we speak the data are being analyzed, inputted, and summarized and you can look for the 2010 reports in Summer of 2011!
As many of you are aware, Alberta Water Quality Awareness (AWQA) Day, our other main program is now going to be run on a three year cycle, with the next event in 2012. This decision came in light of the tightening of funding belts of donors and ALMS' desire to focus on the development of a Lake Management Framework in 2010.
The develop of the Lake Management Framework was born out of requests from lake stewardship groups, concerned citizens, and county representatives who consistently requested direction from ALMS on lake management issues. The intent of the framework is to provide a 'how to' on developing Lake Watershed Management Plans. It will contain a primer on how to obtain existing information about lakes in Alberta (including water quality data), how and what to monitor in your lake when information is not available, and an introduction to lake ecology in Alberta. Currently, the LMF Steering Committee has completed a draft of the Framework and it is undergoing editorial review. We expect a Final Framework to be completed in early 2011. A special thanks to all who attended the ALMS LMF Workshop in November of 2009! ALMS would like to thank our sponsors, Alberta Ecotrust and TD Friends of the Environment.
ALMS continues to be an active member of the Alberta Water Council (AWC) as the representative for the Lake Environment Conservation sector. Jay White, an ALMS member, and Judy Stewart, an ALMS director, have done a fabulous job in representing ALMS on the AWC Board of Directors. Of note, Jay White was recently voted in as the ENGO representative on the AWC executive. As well, ALMS has had great representation on many of the AWC project teams including the Water Allocation Transfer System Upgrade Project Team, Healthy Aquatic Ecosystem Team, Wetlands Policy Team, and Water CEP Sector Planning teams. Currently we have members on the Provincial Ecological Criteria for Healthy Aquatic Ecosystems, Non-Point Source Pollution, Water Allocation Transfer, and Moving from Actions to Words Project Teams. For all these teams, ALMS aim is to ensure that lake protection and conservation, including the ecological processes that sustain them, is considered during policy development.
Lastly, ALMS is excited to welcome our newest staff member and new ALMS Manager: Arin MacFarlane-Dyer. Arin completed a Masters degree in Environmental Biology and Ecology at the University of Alberta within the Integrated Landscape Management Research Group. She then worked with the Cumulative Environmental Management Association (CEMA) and as an ecological consultant before taking some time off for her family. We are very happy to have Arin on board as we move into 2011!
Sincerely,
Steph Neufeld - ALMS President
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2009 Lakewatch Reports AvailableReports on the water quality data collected in the summer of 2009 are now available on the alms website or just click here to be redirected. To more easily find the report you are looking for you can click on the arrows on the top of the table to sort by either year or lake.
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Monitoring Not Adequate: Vaughan
Environment Canada is not adequately monitoring Canada's fresh water resources, says Scott Vaughan, Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, in his report tabled in the House of Commons.
"Environment Canada has been running the federal government's water monitoring programs for 40 years," said Vaughan. "Yet it has not taken such basic steps as defining its responsibilities and responding to the threats to Canada's water resources that it has identified."
The audit found that Environment Canada has not defined its responsibilities for water monitoring, particularly on federal lands such as First Nations reserves, Canadian Forces bases, and national parks and wildlife areas. The Department is not monitoring water quality on most federal lands, and it does not know what monitoring-if any-is being done by other federal departments. It also does not validate the data collected through the water quality monitoring program. As a result, Environment Canada cannot assure users that its water quality data is fit for use.
The audit also found that Environment Canada's monitoring networks have not been adjusted to respond to industrial development, climate change and population growth in certain regions. For example, the Department has only one long-term water quality monitoring station in the Athabasca River, and this station was not designed to monitor pollutants related to oil sands development. Similarly, it only began long-term water quality monitoring in Lake Winnipeg in 2006 even though it was suspected for more than 30 years that nutrient loading of the lake from farming posed a threat. The government now faces a costly clean-up program and has committed $18 million since 2007 to correct the problem and improve monitoring in this region.
"Environment Canada should update its assessment of the threats facing Canada's water resources, from climate change to impacts on human health, so that it can manage its network to understand and respond to the greatest threats," said Vaughan.
Read the chapter on Monitoring Water Resources here |
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Publication of Interest
Lake Effect: Lakes are Warming up around the World
A global lake study and shows signs of lakes warming up around the world. This lake effect warming, according to the study published in an American Geophysical Union publication (http://www.agu.org), is because of climate change and is happening in  many large lakes around the world.
In the first worldwide survey, using thermal infrared imagery, of how lake temperatures are changing due to greenhouse gas emissions http://www.usatoday.com/weather/graphics/2008-04-14-global-warming-graphic_N.htm, scientists report that the Earth's largest lakes have warmed at an average rate of 0.81 degree (F) per decade during the past 25 years. Some lakes warmed as much as 1.8 degrees per decade. Surface temperatures were measured in 167 large lakes worldwide.
The largest and most consistent area of warming was northern Europe. The warming trend was slightly weaker in southeastern Europe, near the Black and Caspian seas and Kazakhstan. The trends increased slightly in Siberia, Mongolia, and northern China.
According to the study, even small changes in water temperature can result in algal blooms that can make a lake toxic to fish or result in the introduction of non-native species that change the lake's natural ecosystem.
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