Lets open this up by stating plainly that while this specific article was inspired by Grand Lake Saint Mary’s State Park, it is in no way a negative commentary on that park, its staff, the Ohio State Park System, or the community that surrounds Grand Lake St. Marys State Park. I find all of which to be wonderful and would be very open to relocating to the area to implement this solution and make this reservoir safe and clean again.
“Wait, what the reservoir isn’t safe and clean?”, you ask. Sorry. I got ahead of myself. I will go back to the beginning.
The wife and I were looking for a place to stretch our legs on our return trip from working the Ohio Bigfoot Jamboree in Ada, Ohio and took an early break at Grand Lake Saint Mary’s State Park. Once we got parked we saw the beach (with a nice wooded breakwater from the main reservoir), and decided to take a walk. We followed the gravel trail along the breakwater and enjoyed the view. It was a really beautiful early fall day too.
Anyway as we came back off the breakwater and walked across the edge of the beach to use the facilities, we saw this sign.
Besides the beach rules and the normal warning about no lifeguard being present, the danger sign stood out.
AVOID ALL CONTACT WITH WATER
Algal toxins at unsafe levels have been detected.
This is a serious issue. And it happens in most of our reservoirs to varying degrees. These algal blooms are mostly preventable, but still our parks are closed and our drinking water is at risk.
Algae blooms (both toxic and toxic) occur whenever there is an abundance of nutrient and light in the aquatic environments that algae live in. They are normal regularly occurring elements in any water system. They become dangerous when algae levels reach saturation points where the toxin levels are high enough to pose a hazard to us.
The reason that these algae blooms reach such dangerously high levels and concentrations is similar (but worse) than the dead zone we create in the Gulf of Mexico. Civilization creates and concentrates a lots of nutrients at polluting levels. Ponds and reservoirs end up catching them through weather related down flow as much as any other source. The problem comes from the fact that artificially created ponds and reservoirs don’t have swamps or wetlands around them to use all this downflow like a natural lake will.
I am not gonna put a swamp in your neighborhood to fix this. Well, not exactly.
I am going to build a swamp imitating system that uses the same methods to clean the water as a real swamp would without it being gross and mosquito-gator infested.
To the neighborhood and people driving by it will look like a row of greenhouses with a store front complete with a landscaping supply and flower shop.
Did you see what I did there? Don’t worry about the Jedi mind tricks. The important thing that we take away from this, well the two most important things we take away from this are:
And the Cernunnos Foundation wants to fix your algae problem. Rather we need to.
Here is the deal. In order to even get “in the game” to do Federal level river clean up to fix the Gulf of Mexico dead zone (that is the major goal of the Cernunnos Foundation and frankly the main reason it even exists), we need to document a large scale example of this system working. For all the details on how the River Refugium Project works check out the banner below. To find out how your community can get your local pond or reservoir cleaned up with the River Refugium Project (RRP), read on.
For more information on how to fix Dead Zones in the Gulf of Mexico and the mouth of other rivers, follow this link —
The answer is simple. Help us set up. Here is a list of what we would need to set up the River Refugium Project at scale.
*Exceptions for minimum 1 acre ponds are densely stocked pay lakes, housing editions, and especially farm ponds. I would love to put this system up against a livestock lagoon.
For starters, it means they will be able to use and fully enjoy their lake again (timeframe dependent on depth of problem/climate). And once we reach capacity, this is without recurring cost.
Cernunnos Foundation does and will always welcome any public higher learning institution to conduct studies and review of our work without additional cost to the University
Beyond that they will gain an ecologically friendly neighbor in the Cernunnos Foundation and of course they can look forward to a new florist and landscape gardener in town.
This offer is open to any community that has a pond or reservoir that has algae issues due to excess nutrient in their water systems.
First dibs will go to Grand Lake St. Marys State Park and its surrounding communities and businesses. Both because their park and reservoir inspired this and I adored the town and park area as I drove through. After that we will review any offer to find the best opportunity to move this work forward.
Don’t have your own pond or reservoir that needs cleaned up? Maybe not quite enough sway to get the town on board?
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As always, feel free to steal this idea and run with it. I just want the work carried out.