The water quality of Grand Lake St. Marys waters has improved with the help of a research project led by a professor at the Wright State University Lake Campus. The study has been published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Environmental Quality.
The study documents how water quality has changed in the past 10 years, and how nutrients and agricultural runoff has affected it. It also covers the development of new best management practices, according to a release from the Wright State Newsroom.
Stephen Jacquemin, associate professor of biology and research coordinator at the Lake Campus has led research efforts on the study, which seeks to improve the quality of watershed and reduce the amount of nutrients getting into the water.
Jacquemin has a background in ecosystems; he has been involved in watershed studies for Wright State for about five years, but his involvement in regional watershed has taken place for nearly ten years.
In years prior to the study, the water of Grand Lake St. Marys was so bad that warnings for people not to come into contact with the water had to be posted. In 2011, the Grand Lake watershed was designated as distressed.
In an interview with WRGT, Jacquemin stated that the distressed watershed designation of the Grand Lake “signified a call to action to really look at these areas of Grand Lake and use community expertise to try and understand the problem.”
Algal blooms in Ohio lakes has been largely attributed to fertilizer getting into the water. Another major problem facing regional waters is nutrients getting into it due to manure application from surrounding farms, according to WRGT.
Other individuals involved in the study include Greg McLinch, the agricultural program coordinator at Lake Campus and Theresa Dirksen, coordinator of Mercer County Agriculture Solutions.
This project requires reconstruction of wetlands in order to filter out stream water before it gets into the lake. The research team has also been working with farmers to develop new practices, according to Jacquemin.
WGRT reports that since the Grand Lake was designated as distressed, farmers have been required to have a nutrient management plan and can no longer spread manure during winter months.
Recently, there has been a reduction in the amount of nutrients in water in the region. “We don’t want to give the impression that water quality issues are fixed – they are certainly not fixed, but we are heading in the right direction,” said Jacquemin.
Jacquemin has stated that the methods used to improve water quality at Grand Lake can be used as a model that could be applied to other Ohio lakes.
The full study is openly accessible to the public, and can be viewed here.
