Lake Erie fishing dependent on competing Ohio toxic algal abatement approaches
Ohio’s new approach to reducing toxic algal blooms in Lake Erie may be too little too late, some observers say. While a developer of new agricultural methods contends that emerging technologies could work to address the problem, an environmental group questions the plan.
Months after taking office in 2019, Gov. Mike DeWine proposed “a comprehensive approach” to reducing oxygen-dead zones by adding nearly $1 billion to water quality projects over 10 years. The zones are avoided by fish.
The state legislature last year approved $172 million in water-quality initiatives, including incentives to farmers who reduce the negative impacts of manure used as fertilizer by implementing a short list of “best practices.” Those include the planting of erosion-reducing cover crops, injecting liquid manure into the soil, and establishment of riparian buffer zones — barriers planted to separate farmland from Lake Erie tributaries.
John Blakeman, a biologist from Sandusky, Ohio, said the new agriculture techniques he’s developing “will stop harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie.”
Mr. Blakeman owns Meadow Environments LLC, a company that studies prairie restoration at NASA’s Plum Brook Station south of Sandusky Bay.
“Our authentic tallgrass prairie strips — with their 6 -foot-deep roots and dense stems, and the unique microbes that grow in the prairie rootzone — chemically bind to both phosphorus and nitrogen ions, locking them in the soil and the prairie plant tissues,” he said.
The roots of rye, radishes and other specific cover crops later planted in dormant seasons also bind to phosphorus and nitrogen.
“As Iowa State University has proven, the prairie strips can capture and retain up to 85% or so of the phosphorus in runoff,” said Mr. Blakeman. “With that, phosphorus loadings in Lake Erie will be too small to induce algal blooms.”
Oxygen-depleted zones force fish to move to waters where the breathing is easier, forcing anglers to find them.
The walleye spawn in the lake’s western basin isn’t affected because the fish migrate throughout the lake before the water warms and the green algal blooms develop. Exceptionally large blooms can expand to cover much of Lake Erie.
Sandy Bihn, founder and executive director of environmental watchdog group Lake Erie Waterkeeper, said last week that despite the recommended farming techniques, Ohio’s new plan still lacks the teeth needed to reduce the inflow of minerals and nutrients that cause excessive algal growth in Lake Erie’s western basin.
“Ohio pays farmers to do these practices. To say they’re ‘getting tough’ on them when they’re paying them to do it is skewed,” she said.
“There is no evidence that these ‘best practices’ reduce concentrations of nitrogen and phosphorus. They’re not bad, but will they really give us the change we need to give us a blue lake again? That’s not really the case.”
The state is cracking down on releases of human waste into the environment. One county is taking legal action to force 14 Amish families to replace their outhouses with self-contained septic systems.
At the same time, said Ms. Bihn, there has been a huge increase in animal feeding operations near the western basin, and corresponding levels of manure are releasing nitrogen and phosphorus into the lake.
“This ‘new plan’ is helpful,” she said, “but the real solution is reducing incoming pollutants.”
Game laws
Last week the state Game Commission appointed Jason Decoskey director of the Bureau of Wildlife Protection. An agency employee for 19 years, Mr. Decoskey advances from assistant director of law enforcement operations following the retirement of former director Randy Shoup.
Purple paint
One element of Pennsylvania’s complex Sunday hunting compromise will take effect Jan. 27. To help protect landowners from trespass, and protect hunters from felony penalties under new “hunting trespass” laws, property owners have the option of using lines of purple paint as an alternative to traditional “No Trespassing” signs.
The paint must be applied to trees or fence posts in strips at least 8 inches long and 1 inch wide, located 3 to 5 feet from the ground. The purple paint law will not be applied in Allegheny and Philadelphia counties.