Burntside Lake Turnover

[hans_ely]

I've noticed a few comments about cloudy water at various ice holes in the last few days. We have a lake water system for our home on Burntside, and I can report that the lake water has definitely turned over in a drmatic fashion in the last 24 hours.

We are used to seeing a fall and spring turnover, when the water gets a little cloudy for a few days, but it seems to me unusual for the spring turnover to occur so early in the spring with three feet of ice still on the lake. Most theories of lake turnover that I have read include some role for wind action initiating the turnover.

I'm just speculating, but perhaps this year's early turnover is a result of the sun warming the water at the surface for the last month when we had almost no snow cover, coupled with the sudden dump of almost of foot of new snow in the last few days, resulting in weight and pressure on the ice forcing some movement not unlike wave mixing.

In any case the lake has turned over, in my opinion, at least on the West end, and that could affect fishing for the last few days of the season.

I would be interested in any other theories about early spring lake turnover while the lake still has ice cover.

[Surface Tension]

The prolonged amount of sunlight that penetrated the lakes may have had something to do with the cloudy water. The moon phase may also have some effects. I believe the moon phase can does have some effect on ocean tides. Just a thought.

[Great Outdoors]

I just talked with a DNR employee in fisheries. He seems to think it is a large crustacean hatch which may have been caused by sunlight penetrating the ice before we got all this snow. These large "schools" of crustaceans slowly move around (like a Lava lamp blob) feeding on phitoplankton (?)

They are microscopic and the large amount of them give the water the weak tea color. Two other young guys were just in the shop and they noticed this on lakes in the Grand Rapids area recently. I'll take a sample of water if we find it again this weekend and let the DNR analyze.

[hans_ely]

Jim, this looks more like a traditional, full scale, fall or spring lake turnover. Our lake water now clearly has some dark sediment in it, well past the point of being drinkable.

This water is normally crystal and clear and we use it for potable water year around. During fall and spring turnover the lake water gets enough sediment in it to clog screens on areators and that is the way it looks right now.

My vision of turnover in this lake is that it is like surface water falling off a 100 foot cliff and hitting the bottom with enough force to stir up significant amounts of lake bottom sediment all over the lake, or at least on the windward shore, in the fall, for example. I see it this way, rather than as a gentle mixing action that might occur in some much shallower lakes.

This is all just my personal theory, though, and what I am observing may be restricted to my little corner of the lake??? Hans

[Great Outdoors]

I ran your theory about turnover when I talked to the man earlier. He said he could not imagine any turnover taking place under ice conditions, and is familiar with your water intake (Andy, DNR, your neighbor) If there is a hatch of crustaceans in your bay, small as they are, it is possible that they could be causing the sediment with their movement, as slow as it is. Take a sample of the water, bring it to the store, or give it to Andy L. and he will take a look under the micrscope and identify what it is. Also, anyone else reading this and finding a similar condition on Burntside, please take a small sample in a clean jar, let me know where you were on the lake, and I'll get the DNR the sample. It will be interesting to see the results.