Doesn't look good for lake levels!

[Gator]

I don't know, as soon as we have 2 1/2 feet to make it from the dock to the lake, we will splash down. I'd bet that it will be going full steam by June, and earlier around ports with a good deep water launch.

 

Didn't GW Bush, among his many other famous tropisms, say something about not counting your broken eggs before they hatch lol?

[HB2]

I got 6 / 7 at  my dock . 

 

Being a member of the prestigious IJC has its perks . 

 

Didn't Bubba say , " I never had sexual relations with that women "? 

 

 

Edited April 12, 2021 by HB2

[muskiedreams]

They closed the IBay launch (state launch managed by the town of Irondequoit) last fall to raise up the launch and parking lot area to compensate for future high water levels. It is still in progress and unusable. The level is lower now than it usually is in the fall.

[jason]

Someone is full of ****. Follow the money

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[Chas0218]

According to their projected numbers they plan to bring up the lake 2' by the end of july.

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[yank my line]

I think you are looking at the wrong line. It's the red line not the blue line.

[maisie]

I think the water is deep enough now to launch.

[muskiedreams]

53 minutes ago, maisie said:

I think the water is deep enough now to launch.

Up periscope!! DIVE DIVE. Must have thought it was amphibious.

[Gill-T]

I am not sure what the IJC was looking at when they say they were looking at Lake Erie levels and were worried?  Lake Erie is down two feet from what I could tell from Saturday.  

[KevinFarrell]

On 4/10/2021 at 10:46 AM, yank my line said:

 

The IJC is still drawing the lake down. The lake is lower now than it was in January! If we don't get a ton of rain in the next month the level of the lake won't come up for the rest of the summer.

 

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IJC isn't "drawing the lake down".  Two weeks ago the team of hydrologists that consult with the commission suggested they are safe to slow outflows because they felt like they were out of the woods from another repeat of 2017 and 2019 (and 1998, 1993, 1976, 1973, 1952 and most of the 1940's which was well before the lake levels were regulated.)

 

I'm amazed more and more at our society's ability to draw simple conclusions and offer their own basic solutions to extremely complex challenges.  "Here's how ya fix the water levels, these guys are all idiots...... Don't listen to the immunologists, here's how ya beat covid..... plan 2014 is the reason for all this water"

 

If the guy who claimed he was from the IJC actually WAS, he might have posted this instead:

 

Lower than average precipitation and winter snowpack runoff have resulted in decreased inflows to Lake Ontario.  The reduced inflows have resulted in lower water levels on Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River.  In response to these conditions, the Board has decided to reduce outflows from Lake Ontario beginning on 10 April, 2021.

 

During January and February this year, the Board was deviating under authority granted by the International Joint Commission (IJC) to remove additional water from Lake Ontario as a result of the risk analysis in December 2020 showing approximately a 28% chance of water levels exceeding a damaging high water threshold in 2021.  A total of 9.4 cm (3.7 in.) was removed from Lake Ontario to further reduce the risk of potentially damaging high water levels in late Spring and early Summer.   

 

Due to the reduced spring runoff, the Board has decided to reduce outflows below those specified by the plan to restore the extra water removed during the winter to Lake Ontario at a rate of approximately 2 cm (0.8 in) of water to Lake Ontario per week for the next three weeks. After these 3 weeks, the Board will revert to plan-prescribed outflows.

 

This strategy will allow Lake Ontario and Lake St. Lawrence water levels to increase more than they would under plan-prescribed flows over the next few weeks.  It now appears likely that Lake Ontario levels will remain below long-term average over the summer unless very wet weather occurs. Most forecast scenarios suggest that Lake Ontario levels will remain above critical low water level thresholds due to lower than average precipitation.

 

 

[HB2]

6 hours ago, KevinFarrell said:

 

IJC isn't "drawing the lake down".  Two weeks ago the team of hydrologists that consult with the commission suggested they are safe to slow outflows because they felt like they were out of the woods from another repeat of 2017 and 2019 (and 1998, 1993, 1976, 1973, 1952 and most of the 1940's which was well before the lake levels were regulated.)

 

I'm amazed more and more at our society's ability to draw simple conclusions and offer their own basic solutions to extremely complex challenges.  "Here's how ya fix the water levels, these guys are all idiots...... Don't listen to the immunologists, here's how ya beat covid..... plan 2014 is the reason for all this water"

 

If the guy who claimed he was from the IJC actually WAS, he might have posted this instead:

 

Lower than average precipitation and winter snowpack runoff have resulted in decreased inflows to Lake Ontario.  The reduced inflows have resulted in lower water levels on Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River.  In response to these conditions, the Board has decided to reduce outflows from Lake Ontario beginning on 10 April, 2021.

 

During January and February this year, the Board was deviating under authority granted by the International Joint Commission (IJC) to remove additional water from Lake Ontario as a result of the risk analysis in December 2020 showing approximately a 28% chance of water levels exceeding a damaging high water threshold in 2021.  A total of 9.4 cm (3.7 in.) was removed from Lake Ontario to further reduce the risk of potentially damaging high water levels in late Spring and early Summer.   

 

Due to the reduced spring runoff, the Board has decided to reduce outflows below those specified by the plan to restore the extra water removed during the winter to Lake Ontario at a rate of approximately 2 cm (0.8 in) of water to Lake Ontario per week for the next three weeks. After these 3 weeks, the Board will revert to plan-prescribed outflows.

 

This strategy will allow Lake Ontario and Lake St. Lawrence water levels to increase more than they would under plan-prescribed flows over the next few weeks.  It now appears likely that Lake Ontario levels will remain below long-term average over the summer unless very wet weather occurs. Most forecast scenarios suggest that Lake Ontario levels will remain above critical low water level thresholds due to lower than average precipitation.

 

 

Now THERE is some complicated scientific data . 

 

My question would be this .... 

 

If you can see the level is very low ,and you know it will be below long term average , why  would you continue after 3 weeks to  increase outflow ? 

 

Unless of course you would want it to be low . 

 

I feel like I am getting my chain jerked. 

 

 

Or they have no idea what they are doing . 

 

That part , I can't figure out . 

 

[lost a lure]

As I said in another post, there is more to it than the level of Lake Ontario

[muskiedreams]

One must take into consideration the fact that long range precipitation estimates are educated guesses. They use computer models to try to make predictions. Around the Great Lakes, you never know for sure exactly what a weather system is going to do. That can make a difference of an inch or two of rain with just one storm, depending on if it stops and hangs, or goes south and east or north and east. The watershed for Lake Ontario is also huge, so depending on where a storm goes, there may be significant runoff into the lake. With that in mind, one storm can have a significant effect on the lake level in a relatively short period of time. And there can be more than one or no significant storms. The latter has happened. In the winter there was no way the IJC could have known that. But if they didn't let enough out in anticipation of a possible wet spring, then everyone could have been complaining of flooding. The lake level can rise up a lot faster than it can be drained. There are a lot of ways water can go in, but only one way it can be drained.

 

They can't just lower the level with the click of a mouse.

Edited April 27, 2021 by muskiedreams

[AnglingAddict]

The IJC really should listen to all of us on the water every day - we know more than they do! They should raise lake levels up so we can all get to our docks - don't they know how much revenue we bring in???  When it's high they need to lower it - we have trips to run!!!!  This is how 90% of the people on this forum respond.  I'm obviously being sarcastic here.   The tribs barely had any flow all fall and winter - we are in a mild drought and they ran water this winter - deviated from the plan to lower the possibility of flooding this spring (who knew what mother nature held in her cards 6 months ago?). The IJC headed the call about concerns over high water - and lowered the lake.  Unfortunately - mother nature is one of the critical inputs here on the overall supply side - if you don't have runoff the levels will decrease when your supply is less that your outflows - simple flux problem.  Runoff, evaporation rates, min/max outflows all contribute.  They can only control the lake levels with one parameter - let out more or let out less - no levers to pull on the input side.  Is the plan flawed?  In my opinion it is - it only looks at the overall level of the lake when determining what the outflows should be across 90% of the expected lake levels - it needs to also consider the overall supply as an input variable or you have a system that doesn't take the rate of change in the levels into consideration which is critical to controlling any watershed - especially so with smaller systems where the timescale of events is more rapid but even at that - the IJC should have known by looking at the rate of change of supply that they were headed for an issue in the high water years.  They have some smart people on the board and I'm positive they look at those parameters but when looking at how to distribute the pain across the stakeholders - the riparian stakholders and lake users tend to take the brunt because a slow flood or slow reduction in levels is easier to manage then catastrophically and dangerously flooding out inhabitants downstream.  So I think unfortunately that's why we see what we see - we are the stakeholders that minimize the time element of the disaster - as in it happens slow and we can react accordingly.  The priorities are shipping and downstream safety. 

[muskiedreams]

AnglingAddict They need to invite God to be a member of the board.

[Gill-T]

I would suggest water level markers at all marinas and just make phone calls.  You could have Marina operators submit pictures of water levels against water level markers on sea walls. Lots of real time data that doesn’t require buoy data or computer/math projections. 

[HB2]

And on a side note , how much warm water species spawning habitat has been lost for this year ? 

 

Many of the shallow bays and swampy areas are dry this year . 

 

 

[Gator]

So, my understanding of Plan 2014 is that it incorporates both high and low water levels throughout a decade long progression, in order to mimic the natural fluctuations you'd see in a pristine environment.

 

I'm not saying that's right or wrong, just that IMHO the low water levels this year aren't completely unexpected. I mean, there's not a reasonable person who would look at how low the lake was this winter and think that Mother Nature could possibly provide enough water to raise the levels to what they were during our record high years - remember, both of those years started high, and there was record input. This year, we started low. Even record input would have only brought us to average. 

 

My take home is that this was planned to be one of the low years, and that the lack of precipitation exacerbated the planned low, leading to the current situation. Yes, you can't predict influx, but this is not a completely random outcome that depended on Mother Nature's input. It's a situation that was created by intent, and the pendulum swung too far.

Edited April 27, 2021 by Gator

[Silver Fox]

“.8 inches/week”........


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[Gill-T]

Has anyone checked on the baby ducks and fingerling pike?  I am fairly concerned. 

[reel peace]

Not looking good Scott I know Frank is not putting slips in

“.8 inches/week”........


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[KevinFarrell]

I agree with AnglingAddict the IJC could have been more responsive to the rate of change of supply in the past, especially the 2016/17 winter they were too restrictive w outflows and it cost us dearly.

 

See the attachment, we're likely going to be about a foot low this year with an average rainfall spring.  From my selfish perspective, not having to hump another 700 sandbags out to our little island in the St Lawrence is a big relief.

[GAMBLER]

IJC is upping the outflow tomorrow.  WTF!   

[reelintense]

And being from the IJC ,I ask this , can't you guys read ? 
 
We told everyone to expect a 7.2 ft difference from high to low AND be prepared to live with it . Sorry if it disrupts your lives , but we have shipping and hydro power to worry about . 
 
Oh yea , the real reason for all this is to save the wetland , almost forgot . 

HB2...
Obviously there are frustrations running on both sides and as a human, I get there are opinions and emotions and we can’t possibly understand the intricacies of trying to find middle ground for ALL parties involved. With that being said, I first and foremost and believe the fishermen here would agree, don’t want flooding, so lower is better than higher. Except for the know reason of improving wetlands, but we haven’t seen any data to show or confirm that this maybe working. Only asking because it appears that as water levels this winter went lower, and it was seen that snow pack and icing (which prevents lakes evaporation) was definitely less, the IJC increased flows thru about mid March (if I remember correctly, as I didn’t go back this second and verify again) and then it appeared to us the lake was too low when you started to slow outflows and we saw some lake increase. All most of us know as boaters only... myopically looking out for ourselves that many of us couldn’t launch boats. Some people have trailerable boats and could find a port, some like me, have larger boats that need to be lifted or heavy loaders to launch and at the time on Sodus Bay only 1 launch was deep enough to take larger boats and it wasn’t my marina. So many were searching for places and gas docks in many places were in excessible for gas because it’s still so low, there are a few, but still.... we are all trying to live and understand how decisions are made, why the plan had to be changed (except for wetlands) and is there a better way for a path forward? We don’t know, we just know as “the lake guys” we launch early (my boat was APRIL 2nd) and normally I stay in til end of October. Will we even have enough water by end of summer to get boats OUT, let alone keep fishing? There are plenty of shoreline communities that also rely on tourism and boats for their short season of revenue and I don’t think the pandemic has helped. Maybe a suggestion is a much more aligned monthly newsletter of exactly WHAT AND WHY things are done and calculated and measured and and and. Hard for humans to not question, if things aren’t articulated for why decisions may be being made. Just my humble observations.
For what it’s worth. Thanks
Jason



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[GAMBLER]

2 minutes ago, reelintense said:

 

HB2...
Obviously there are frustrations running on both sides and as a human, I get there are opinions and emotions and we can’t possibly understand the intricacies of trying to find middle ground for ALL parties involved. With that being said, I first and foremost and believe the fishermen here would agree, don’t want flooding, so lower is better than higher. Except for the know reason of improving wetlands, but we haven’t seen any data to show or confirm that this maybe working. Only asking because it appears that as water levels this winter went lower, and it was seen that snow pack and icing (which prevents lakes evaporation) was definitely less, the IJC increased flows thru about mid March (if I remember correctly, as I didn’t go back this second and verify again) and then it appeared to us the lake was too low when you started to slow outflows and we saw some lake increase. All most of us know as boaters only... myopically looking out for ourselves that many of us couldn’t launch boats. Some people have trailerable boats and could find a port, some like me, have larger boats that need to be lifted or heavy loaders to launch and at the time on Sodus Bay only 1 launch was deep enough to take larger boats and it wasn’t my marina. So many were searching for places and gas docks in many places were in excessible for gas because it’s still so low, there are a few, but still.... we are all trying to live and understand how decisions are made, why the plan had to be changed (except for wetlands) and is there a better way for a path forward? We don’t know, we just know as “the lake guys” we launch early (my boat was APRIL 2nd) and normally I stay in til end of October. Will we even have enough water by end of summer to get boats OUT, let alone keep fishing? There are plenty of shoreline communities that also rely on tourism and boats for their short season of revenue and I don’t think the pandemic has helped. Maybe a suggestion is a much more aligned monthly newsletter of exactly WHAT AND WHY things are done and calculated and measured and and and. Hard for humans to not question, if things aren’t articulated for why decisions may be being made. Just my humble observations.
For what it’s worth. Thanks
Jason



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Low is not good and high is not good.  Why cant we just achieve Historical average and ride it?  In February, the IJC released a statement that they had reached the historical average but were going to continue to let water out to be ready for the snow melt.  The marinas on Sandy Creek are unusable due to low water.  If the water doesn't come up, we are screwed.  The IJC needs to use common sense and look at precipitation, lake levels of the upper great lakes (inflow) and snow pack amounts.  We were in a drought last year, behind in snowfall over the entire Lake Ontario basin, and behind in total precipitation this spring.  Why cant they just use common sense and data that is readily available?