July 18, 2011

 

Ingemar Ekstrom called the meeting to order.

 

Members present: Ingemar Ekstrom, Barb Romstad, Dave Pease, Sally Pease, Glenda Mattila, Mitch McGee, Jeremy Bates, Gerald Gustafson (Gus), Lee Wiesner

 

Absent: Pamela Toshner

 

Ingemar reviewed the minutes from the last meeting. A motion to accept the minutes for the June 20^th meeting was made by Dave Pease, seconded by Glenda Mattila; passed.

 

Gus handed out a report from Matt Berg detailing the EWM presence on Tomahawk Lake. It is Matt’s opinion that the EWM plants survived the treatment of 2008 and are now emerging more aggressively. Matt suggested a small blanket treatment of the area next spring and possible dive team removal yet this summer.

 

Some discussion followed on the presence of EWM in area lakes and how it has been treated in different cases. It seems there are different opinions on treatments and their effects.

 

Sally indicated the program is going well. She had a couple volunteer “no-shows.” She thinks traffic has been down lately. Things went well over the 4^th – it would have been nice to have more of the CBCW handout towels.

 

Gus gave the group a summary of the up-to-date costs of the EWM project for 2011. We are pretty close to the 25/75 slit on the monitoring program. The treatment of Sand Bar Lake project will be a little more difficult to reach a 25/75 split on. Jeremy indicated the use of the pontoon boat for water testing can be an in-kind donation at current rental rates.

 

Ingemar distributed the CBCW coordinator job description he put together combining info he received from Sally and the Town of Barnes. Barb will prepare the final document.

Lee came up with a list of 40 lakes that do not have shoreline monitors. Sally, Ingemar and Lee have been contacting residents of the lakes to get people to be a monitor for their lakes. The group has been pretty successful in getting volunteers. A final list should be complete by the August meeting. Sally and Ingemar will get the names of their confirmed monitors to Lee so he can compile one list.

 

 

 

 

Jeremy is conducting training for the people who have volunteered to be shoreline monitors. He handed out a sheet that outlined a monitoring plan with illustrations of the species to look for. 

 

Glenda has collected some samples that look suspicious and will be checked to see if they are EWM. Six spots of EWM have been identified in Sand Bar Lake. The plants were small and had emerged from stems of the large dead plants. The native plants appeared unaffected by the recent chemical treatment. We haven’t heard any information from the DNR as to what action will be taken.

 

People on Sand Bar Lake have been pretty good about maintaining a “no-wake” lake.

 

A WDNR, UW graduate student, Paul Skawinski who is doing research on EWM will be studying 14 area lakes. He is asking permission to use the landing on Sand Bar Lake.

 

Some discussion ensued concerning what is going to happen now that some EWM has been found in both Tomahawk and Sand Bar Lakes.

 

The group would like to get a coordinated plan between the different groups that have been involved in the research study.

 

Lee will work with Ron Pearson to get the Rapid Response plan in a section of its own on the website.

·         Suspicious plants were found on George Lake and they have been submitted to the DNR for analysis.

·         A resident brought a sample of suspicious weeds to the Upper Eau Lake monitor for analysis and it was determined that none of the samples were invasive species. The group was appreciative that local property owners and monitors are vigilant.