2022 Milfoil Strategy

Dear friends and members of the Paradox Lake Association,

How is our fight against Eurasian Water Milfoil (EWM) going?

As was mentioned in Dan Gorke’s year end newsletter, the EWM population in Paradox Lake is slowly growing. It is not growing rapidly due to the tremendous effort from all of our volunteers and our expanding efforts with our commercial harvesting partner Aqualogic, but unfortunately it is slowly expanding. We are not yet seeing the type of dense mats of EWM that are seen in lakes that have lost control of the EWM population but we have also not been able to reduce the population.

 What Are The Options To Bring EWM Under Control Going Forward?

Based on our research into the experiences of other lake associations and input from others with EWM control experience, there are 3 possible options going forward:

1. Accept that we will not be able to control EWM and reduce our spend/effort to a minimal level. This will eventually result in a complete spread throughout the Lower lake and dense mats of EWM in a number of places in the lake. Dense mats in the Narrows will inhibit navigation between the Upper and Lower lakes.

2. Continue with our current approach, looking to maintain the EWM population at its current levels. This is possible, but it will require a continued high level of volunteer efforts and PLA membership funding. It is difficult to predict if the current level of spending will control the population or if the required spend will increase over time.

3. Significantly increase our spending for a 3 year period to reset the EWM population to a much lower level. This allows us to move to a much lower annual spend/effort to maintain the new lower population after the spending surge is complete. The experience of other lakes is that this approach works. Experience of other lakes is that this surge is best accomplished with a combination of increased hand harvesting and targeted application of an EWM specific herbicide in the areas with the highest density of EWM plants. 

The PLA Board of Directors believes that Option 1 is an unacceptable outcome and proven approaches exist to avoid this outcome. Option 2 is possible but it will put a perpetual burden on the finances and time of the PLA members and will be difficult to sustain over the long term. The Board has chosen to move forward with Option 3 to generally reduce the amount of EWM in the lake and to reduce the strain on the membership. While Option 3 requires higher spending in 2022-2024, you can see in the chart below that the total spend over time will be equal to, or lower than the spend in Option 2.

Can the PLA afford to progress Option 3?

As is shown in the chart below, our best estimates of costs involved in progressing Option 3 will result in a cumulative funding gap in 2022-2024 of approximately $100,000 versus the level of annual fund raising achieved by the PLA during recent years. A part of this gap will be covered by financial reserves maintained by the PLA but the Board is exploring other funding sources to close the remaining gap. We will be presenting our issue and plan to the Schroon Lake town board and will be working with the Essex County government to explore funding options. The PLA Grants committee and Fundraising committee will be exploring additional funding options, and we will be reaching out to our PLA members.

Is the use of an herbicide in Paradox Lake safe?

One point Dan made in his year end message was that the Paradox Lake water quality continues to be excellent, carrying the highest rating by the NY DEC and being suitable for drinking. The PLA Board will not pursue any option to reduce EWM that will compromise this rating. The herbicide we are considering in Option 3 has the trade name of ProcellaCOR and has been in use treating EWM infestations for a number of years. It is considered essentially non-toxic for mammals and fish and has little effect on native plant species. It is used routinely in New Hampshire lakes and was approved for use in the Adirondacks by the APA and DEC for the first time in 2020. Because it has very low toxicity and is used in very low concentrations, the first approved application was not required to take any precautions to physically isolate the treated areas from the rest of the water column as is frequently done when using other herbicides.  

ProcellaCOR was successfully applied in Minerva Lake in 2020 with great results. Following this success, a number of Adirondack lakes are currently pursuing permits to apply this herbicide, including Lake George. The PLA Board is closely monitoring the progress of these other lakes as we begin to progress our own permits. 

We have included some information on ProcellaCOR safety on the PLA website. You can find it by clicking HERE.

So what are the next steps?

The PLA Board is moving quickly to ensure we can begin taking the necessary steps to reduce the EWM population in 2022 and 2023. We are putting contracts in place with our commercial EWM harvesting partner, a lake management firm who will help us with the herbicide permitting process, and a contractor to conduct a plant survey required by the permit process. We are also expanding our Invasives committee and improving our processes so we will be as efficient as possible in directing our contract and volunteer resources this coming year. 

We do want to make sure all the PLA members are part of the process as we take these important next steps in our fight against EWM. You will be receiving an invitation to a ZOOM call soon to allow you to improve your understanding of the plan and to raise questions to the board. We have also established a new section on the PLA website to give you access to information on the plan, the process, and answers to questions others have raised. You can access it by clicking HERE.

In closing…

We are embarking on a bigger, and very important, next step in our fight to minimize the negative impact that Eurasian Water Milfoil will have on our lake and our ability to enjoy this lake that we all love. It will take a couple of years of hard work but will result in a much better situation for the lake going forward. We, the PLA Board, are looking forward to taking on this challenge and look forward to working closely with all of you to make this effort a success.

Sincerely,

Paradox Lake Association Board