Toxic to Our Health, Toxic to Our Business: the Continuous Battle Against Lake Champlain's Algae Blooms

What do you do when one of your state’s biggest attractions has fallen victim to spontaneous bursts of toxicity? What can be done when your state’s most accessible site for swimming, fishing, sailing, and vacationing has become the toilet bowl for agricultural, urban, and suburban runoff? Fortunately, like many polluted reputations, Lake Champlain’s is misunderstood. While the lake has been burdened with sporadic blooms of cyanobacteria, also known as blue green algae, we, as its only available saviors, are burdened with sifting through the problem’s numerous sources, deciding which deserves our time and money the most. Unfortunately, like the solutions to many problems, Lake Champlain’s is a double-edged sword.

I began my research close, first speaking with Douglas Facey, Professor of Biology at St. Michael’s College. Facey mainly studies the fish of Lake Champlain and humbly claims no expertise on the situation, but sat me down and outlined the lake’s predicament so thoroughly that it was clear he’d spent years and years immersed in it. 

The problem begins with phosphorus. Phosphorus runoff, mostly from agricultural sources, but also urban and suburban sources, creates and feeds algae blooms in the lake. These algae blooms are formally referred to as cyanobacteria, most commonly known as blue green algae. 

Unfortunately, agricultural sources contribute the most runoff simply because it's easiest for them: all it takes is a mood-change from Mother Nature. As rainfall stirs soil into a soupy mess, nutrients are dug up, rushing into the lake through streams of runoff. Urban land development is also a contributor, though their contribution is far more conscious. "Sometimes people are too anxious to point the finger at the farmers," Facey said, "but the reality is, every time you put in a new road or a shopping center, you increase the rate at which the water is going to rush off that land." From there, "it surges into the local rivers and streams and creeks, there's a lot of turbulence, and there's a lot of phosphorus that's just literally tied up with particles of soil and sand."

But no matter where the runoff comes from, Mother Nature has the final say once it's in the lake. During the summer, preexisting blooms are often fed and expanded by the heat. Depending on how much rain falls, when it falls, and what the temperature of the air is, algae blooms are created and fed at different times, and different locations throughout the lake. In other words, this is not always a problem, and when it is, it’s not everywhere. However, that’s no excuse to ignore the problem.

Lake Champlain is heavily relied on by summer business such as lake-side cottages, as well as summer activities like sailing, fishing, and swimming. The issue for them is simple and clear: would you be inclined to dip a single toe in neon gunk-infested water? Would you even want to look at neon gunk-infested water, for that matter? It’s an eyesore, and a toxic eyesore to boot.  

 Suspicious color at the dock. (photo by Claire Cavanaugh)

Aesthetics aside, blue green algae may also be producing harmful toxins at any given time. At these times, swimming could generate rashes and irritation, and pets that may be drinking the water could get sick, or even die."That's when the newspapers finally pay attention," said Declan McCabe, Biology Department Chair and Associate Professor at St. Michael's College.

At this point, Vermonters have been not only aware, but also combative of this issue for decades. So, why haven’t we seen any results?

Examining the big picture, solutions seem hopeless.
They're complex. Denise Smith, Executive Director of Friends of Northern Lake Champlain, could only say "wow! Tough questions," in response to my initial inquiries that I previously assumed were simple and straightforward. In addition to their layers of complexity, as Facey mentioned, most solutions to halting phosphorus runoff are long-term and expensive. McCabe, unfortunately, could only confirm this. However, he could also offer some more hopeful, everyday type of solutions that your everyday, ordinary Vermont resident could take part in.

Over the summer break, McCabe runs St. Michael's' branch of the Vermont EPSCoR, a water-sampling program, with student interns. "We have auto-samplers that are set up around the lake, but mostly around the rivers," said McCabe. "What happens is as soon as there's a storm and water starts to rise in the river, it triggers the auto-sampler. And the auto-sampler will take samples at regular intervals over the course of the storm." Once the auto-samplers have done their duty, McCabe and the interns capture the "contaminants" for further examination in their lab at St. Michael's' Cheray Science Hall.

 

Dried out-samples.

 

Different samples containing different levels of phosphorus (furthest to the right with the most phosphorus, most likely from an agricultural source.)

 Refrigerated water samples.

In addition to examining the problem with the summer intern program, McCabe said that St. Michael's, along with the state, have built a retention pond near multiple paved surfaces on campus, in order to trap the runoff from flowing into streams, and later into the lake. 

At this point, it seems as if the only hope for stopping further runoff into the lake is to carry out processes such as these. McCabe suggests, "we can continue to build our infrastructure in terms of retention ponds, and reducing the amount of runoff." In terms of solutions closer to home, he says, "reduce impervious surfaces, make rain gardens, rain barrels, anything to keep the roof water and the driveway water out of the street. Get it onto your garden instead. Let it soak into the landscape and reduce that erosive potential."

All of these would aid in preventing phosphorus runoff into the lake. However, incoming runoff isn't the entirety of the problem. "There's a deep, thick legacy of phosphorus in the lake that is on the bottom," said McCabe, "and it recirculates, and it doesn't tend to leave the system easily." So before we thicken that legacy even further, we need to prevent incoming runoff. In McCabe's view of things, "you're choosing between a permanent problem and a long-term problem. So I think you should choose the long-term problem." 

It seems simple at first glance: redirect the rain in your very own backyard. Stop the incoming runoff. Then deal with the damage that's already been done.

 But can we enforce that in enough homes to make an impact?

As we've seen in the endless efforts to reduce our carbon footprint, it can be a difficult and often frustrating task to convince every last person to do their part, even if that part is far smaller and simpler than we may assume. 

Higher authority, on the other hand, have taken steps to enforce certain regulations on the runoff's biggest source: local farms. Back in May, Governor Peter Shumlin announced a revised version of his Lake Champlain clean-up plan to the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency). Amongst brief, vague mentions of wastewater plants, Shumlin is quite specific in targeting farms. The Lake Champlain Committee reports on their official site, "the draft plan calls for additional permitting and inspections across a variety of sectors. The state would increase farm inspections and revise accepted agricultural practices to be more protective of water quality." As for the rest of the runoff's sources, "EPA has yet to inform the state of the specific target pollution reduction goals for each watershed. That information is expected to be released by the end of the year."

Until then, it seems as if local farms will be taking the majority of the hits.  

"The state brought us a letter last spring in regards to our manure pit running over," said Johanna Paradee, a farm-resident in St. Alban's, Vermont. "They had run warning after warning in the papers and the news for farmers not to spread, because the land had not unthawed...[but] the manure would run into the Missisquoi River, the most polluted tributary of Lake Champlain, which borders a large piece of our property." 

According to Paradee, Vermont students are brought up to be conscientious. "We are educated from a young age on the Champlain Valley water basin and all the action we can do to prevent the pollution. Tributaries, buffer strip policies, foreign plant invasions, and in-the-field community service are all a part of our schooling," she said. But sometimes, background knowledge isn't enough. There's only so much that they can do to abide by that warning while effectively maintaining their farm.

"Time is huge on the farm," Paradee emphasizes. "To keep things safe and orderly for both farm-workers and livestock, we would have to go twenty-four-seven, three hundred and sixty five...you never find a farmer awake without a few cups of coffee." All the while, they "run a 200 milking cow farm, with additional heifers, calves, and dry cows between six men, two being part-time. There's never enough time in the day to get done crop work, barn-tending, and maintenance that are necessary to keep the farm afloat." And while Paradee's farm received only a warning, the time required to "respond to the letter and deal with the state agency" was valuable time lost. 

"Some day, small and medium farms will not exist," Paradee notes dismally. "We strive hard to get by, but without support, it is unclear where the Vermont Dairy Industry is headed."

As of now, it seems pretty unclear where Lake Champlain's future is headed as well. Amidst a sea of vague solutions, it's difficult to predict which would dig us out of this hole we've created. 
After considering Paradee's input, I have to wonder if it's even possible. It seems very likely that Vermont will always be dealing with runoff and pollution to some degree. The question is, what degree would we be willing to live with? What will we sacrifice in the process? All in all, are we even being realistic in our attempts towards a complete cleansing of Lake Champlain?

"I don't think it's unrealistic to try," said Facey. "I think we have to try."

And try we will.



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Vermont Department of Health

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