Surface Water Temperature: 75.9 F
Water Clarity: 11.5 Feet
Lake Level: 803.1 Feet above sea level
Lake Level Relative to Weir: -0.4 Feet
Observations: Monday (7/5/21), The water clarity has decreased by ~7 feet over the last week to 11.5 feet and the surface water temperature has increased 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit to 75.9 Fahrenheit. There were lake wide areas of a Gloeotrichia bloom, an early season blue-green algae species, visible in the water column in most areas of the lake this morning. The Gleotrichia bloom varied from light to very heavy depending on location. For more information on Gloeotrichia see the articles at HARMFUL ALGAL BLOOMS | Honeoye Lake (honeoyelakewatershed.org)
The DEC recommends that you, your family, and pets avoid contact with water that contains blue-green algae bloom like Gloeotrichia. Everyone should be very careful to watch for blue-green algae blooms for the next few weeks.
Today, July 5th, the lake has restratified starting the process of releasing legacy phosphorus from the bottom sediments all over again. You can see on the temperature and dissolve oxygen graphs to the left that the lake is stratified at ~7.5 m (~24.5 feet) again. Weather will determine when the lake mixes later this month or in August.
When a lake stratifies and forms a thermocline the decaying organic matter, dead algae and weed fragments, on the lake bottom consumes dissolved oxygen in the water below the thermocline. When the dissolved oxygen has been completely consumed the phosphorus iron bond in the bottom sediments becomes weak releasing legacy phosphorus into the water near the bottom sediments.
Always use your own visual assessment before making contact with the lake water at this time of year as the blue-green algae situation can change daily if not hourly. Please regularly check the DEC HABs alert map for more detailed updates on Honeoye Lake HABs alerts:
Click on the blue outlined box that says "Log in / Sign up" in the upper right hand corner of this page to sign-up to be notified when we update our weekly Honeoye Lake water quality blog.
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- Click on this link for "2021 Honeoye Lake Aeration Engineering Planning Project"
- The NYSDEC has recently released a new report “Feasibility Assessment of Harmful Algal Bloom Management Options for Honeoye Lake and Conesus Lake” as a follow-up to their 2018 Honeoye and Conesus Lake HABs Action Plans. Click on the link SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH | Honeoye Lake (honeoyelakewatershed.org)below to see report:
This report evaluates various techniques for mitigating Harmful Algae Blooms in Honeoye Lake by preventing the release of legacy phosphorus from the lake bottom sediments.
- Click on this link for HLWTF Winter newsletter: e6fc30_ef8d01223f42408ba11b3a7a5f83bebe.pdf
- Click on this link for "2020 Water Quality: What, Why, What's Next"