Sunday June 8, 2025 Honeoye Lake Water Quality
- Terry Gronwall
- Jun 8
- 2 min read
Updated: Jun 9
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Sunday June 8, 2025 Honeoye Lake Water Quality
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Surface Water Temperature: ~68.2 F
Water Clarity: ~10.9 Feet
Lake Level: 803.4 Feet above sea levelÂ
Lake level +.1 Feet (~1.2 inches) above normal
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Observations: Sunday (6/8/25), Water clarity was ~10.9 feet an increase of 1 foot over the last week. The surface water temperature was ~68.2 F an increase of ~3.8 F over the last week. We did not visually see any signs of algae today. The Canadian wildfire smoke was heavy over Honeoye Lake today!
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Several research studies have found that most of the phosphorus that fuels Honeoye Lake’s blue-green algae blooms is released from the lake bottom sediments when the lake’s dissolved oxygen level goes below 0.5 mg/L in the deeper parts of the lake. The dissolved oxygen (DO) level near the lake bottom at ~9 m (~30 feet) was 6.74 mg/L today. This means that phosphorus should not be released from the bottom sediments into the deepest part of the lake water at this time.  Lake was stratified (i.e. had a thermocline) at ~5 m (~16.5 feet) deep. If we do not have a lake mixing event soon, we expect that the dissolved oxygen near the bottom will go anoxic (DO = <0.5 mg/L) later in June releasing phosphorus from the bottom sediments potentially fueling a blue-green algae bloom.  See temperature and DO graphs to the left.
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The Curly Leaf Pond Weed is growing to the water’s surface in many areas of the lake now. Curly Leaf Pond Weed is an invasive macrophyte (Aquatic Vegetation) that grows to the water’s surface starting in late May and dies off naturally by late June or early July. Its leaves look like Lasagna. See picture on left.
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We have received a report of a panfish die off along the SE shore of Honeoye Lake. We do not know how widespread the panfish die off is yet. We have reported the panfish die off to NYS DEC Region 8 Fisheries Department to investigate.
We will not start making our blue-green algae surveillance runs until early July.
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As of today, there has not been any public HAB reports submitted to the DEC HABs alert map (NYHABS) yet this year.
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:
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Click on the link below to see the Honeoye Lake Watershed Task Force 2025 Winter Newsletter:
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Please click on the link below to read the FLCC Muller Field Station April 2025 Newsletter and register for one of their winter events:
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All operators of motorized vessels, regardless of age, will need a boating safety certificate by January 1, 2025.
Click on the link below for more information and the schedule of local NYS Safe Boating classes:
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Click on the link below to see the Honeoye Lake Watershed Stormwater Toolkit:
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