Surface Water Temperature: ~73.9 F
Water Clarity: ~8.25 Feet
Lake Level: 803.2 Feet above sea level
Lake Level Relative to Weir: -0.3 Feet
Observations: Tuesday (6/21/22), The water clarity has decreased ~1.75 feet to ~8.25 feet and the surface water temperature has increased ~3.2 F to ~73.9 F over the last week. The lake completely mixed top to bottom sometime since last Friday. This would have brought up phosphors released from the bottom sediments into the whole water column. This could potentially fuel a lake wide blue-green algae bloom later this week.
There was light algae visible at most of our HAB monitoring locations. It looks like green dots in the water column. See surface water picture on the left.
We took the image of today’s Gloeotrichia algae sample on the left using a high-powered microscope. Gloeotrichia blooms usually start in mid-June in Honeoye Lake. Gleotrichia gets its nutrients directly from the bottom sediments rather than from the nutrients in the lake water. We also found some Dolichospermum (Anabaena). For more information on Gloeotrichia and Dolichospermum (Anabaena) see the articles at HARMFUL ALGAL BLOOMS | Honeoye Lake (honeoyelakewatershed.org) or search the internet for information.
The DEC recommends that you, your family, and pets avoid contact with water that contains a blue-green algae bloom like Gloeotrichia and Dolichospermum (Anabaena). Everyone should be very careful to watch for blue-green algae blooms for the next few weeks.
We did have a complete mixing event sometime between June 18-20. You can see the effects of the mixing event by the lines on the graph to the left converging. This would have brought up phosphors released from the bottom sediments into the whole water column. This could potentially fuel a lake wide blue-green algae bloom later this week. The two data trends to watch are the rapidity increasing water temperature at all water depths and that the dissolved oxygen at 9 meters (30 feet) stays above 1 mg/L. When the dissolved oxygen level at 9 meters (30 feet) goes below 1 mg/L the phosphorus/iron bond will start to break releasing phosphorus into the deep water below the thermocline potentially providing fuel for a blue-green algae bloom later this summer. Dissolved oxygen at 9 m was 6.4 mg/L today. This means that phosphorus will remain bond to iron in the bottom sediments at this time. Surface water temperature was ~73.9F & bottom water temperature was ~70.0 F. 1-meter equals 3.3 feet.
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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The Town of Richmond has obtained an emergency DEC permit to dredge the shale and sediment deposits out of Mill Creek from just behind the Mill Creek Café to the 20A bridge and under the 20A bridge in the NYS DOT Road right away. This work has already started as of June 20, 2022. See attached pictures. This project should reduce flooding risk from Mill Creek in the Hamlet and lessen the negative impact Mill Creek is having on the Outlet Creek flow. Richmond is working on a long-range plan to address other stream flow issues in the Outlet Creek and Mill Creek. We will keep you posted.
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There is a feature article on Honeoye Inlet Wildlife Management area starting on page 24 in the April/May 2022 edition of the Conservationist.
You can find more information about the Honeoye Inlet Restoration project in the Fall of 2016 at https://www.honeoyelakewatershed.org/honeoye-inlet-restoration-project
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DEC Region 8 stocked Walleye Fingerlings in Honeoye Lake last Friday June 17, 2022. The DEC has stocked ~40,000 Walleye Fingerlings every year since June 2018. This is ~200,000 Walleye Fingerlings over the last five (5) years. We are starting to get reports of more adult Walleyes being caught over the last couple of years.
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The NYS DEC has started a new program to manage the Sunfish and Crappie population in several NYS lakes including Honeoye Lake. Sunfish 8” minimum length with a 15 per day catch limit and Crappie 10” minimum length with a 25 per day limit. For more information see the NYS DEC information page on this program: Sunfish and Crappie Management - NYS Dept. of Environmental Conservation
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- Click on this link for the Winter 2022 HLWTF Newsletter:
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- Click on this link to see the new HLWTF Honeoye Lake Watershed Storm Water Took Kit if you are planning any storm water projects on your property:
- Click on this link for "Honeoye Lake: 2021 State of the Lake article":
Draft Aeration Planning Project Report, Public Information Meeting Presentation, and WebEx recording posted on the HLWTF web site:
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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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