How Low Will It Go?

By John Myers, Duluth News-Tribune, Minn.

Apr. 27–When a lake is more than 1,300 feet deep in spots, losing 18 inches of water doesn’t seem like much of a problem.

But close to shore, especially in harbors and back bays, the lowest water levels in more than 80 years are causing headaches and hardship for boaters. And low water is causing concern for some natural resources.

Low water levels are restricting access to Lake Superior for big recreational boats, especially sailboats that have 6- to 8-foot keels. It’s happening around the lake, from the Grand Marais city harbor through the Twin Ports and on to Ashland and Bayfield.

“We’re getting them into the water, but I’m not sure they can all get into their slips,” said Joel Johnson, co-owner of Lakehead Boat Basin marina in Duluth. “It’s low. I’d say its 5 inches lower than last fall when we were taking them out.” Officially, the lake is about 18 inches below normal, and more than a foot below the level at this time last spring. In March, the lake came within a few inches of reaching the all-time record low set in 1926.

As it does every April, the lake level is moving up. But it’s not going up as much as usual. It’s possible the lake could set monthly low records this summer if rainfall across the lake’s watershed doesn’t increase.

Johnson said he’s got 6 to 7 feet of clearance, enough for most sailboats. He said the marina may be forced to dredge some spots, but has to wait until June because of regulations aimed at protecting spawning fish.

The problem is worse for Park Point residents and others accustomed to tying up their boats at private docks on the bay side. There, as the water drops, it also moves farther away from shore, leaving some docks with just a few inches of water below them.

On the lake side of Park Point, the low water has exposed wider sand beaches. On the bay side, in the Twin Ports harbor, sand bars and mud flats have been exposed for the first time in recent memory. It’s so shallow where the Duluth Rowing Club holds its races that their oars may hit bottom.

“It’s the lowest I’ve seen it, and I’ve been here since we opened in 1980,” said Joe Radtke, general manager of Barker’s Island Marina in Superior. The largest marina on Lake Superior with 420 slips, Barker’s Island has a naturally deep harbor and floating docks that adjust to changing water levels.

Even then, Radtke said, it may be a close call for bigger boats.

“We usually say we guarantee 8 feet throughout the [marina]. But there are places where it’s shallower than that now,” he said.

The lakers and salties are leaving the Twin Ports with lighter loads as well. That means more trips, more fuel and more boats to haul the same loads. For every inch below full draft that the lake drops, the boats lose between 50 tons and 270 tons of capacity, depending on the size of the vessel.

Fred Shusterich, president of Midwest Energy in Superior, this week said 1,000-footers are leaving his dock with about 59,000 tons of coal, down even from last year’s low average of 62,000 tons and way down from high-water loads of 68,000 tons. Dredging channels would help, but those programs have diminished with funding cuts.

Meanwhile, near Ashland, low water in the Kakagon Sloughs backwater connected to Lake Superior is causing concern over wild rice beds. While low water on inland lakes usually means good wild rice crops, low water in the sloughs has Bad River Ojibwe authorities concerned.

Dry rice beds during the growing season could reduce this year’s crop over large portions of the sloughs, said Matt O’Claire, a game warden with Bad River’s Natural Resources Department.

“I’ve talked to a lot of elders, and none of them can remember when it looked like this,” O’Claire said. “Some of them, they won’t even come out here because they don’t want to see it. It’s just too painful.”

Tom Doolittle, a fish and wildlife biologist, calls the changes “catastrophic.”

“A lot of the sample sites for wild rice are bone dry,” he said.

Because wild rice seeds can lay dormant in the lake bottom for a decade or more, the problem probably will be solved when higher water returns. But the low water also could allow more non-native plants and weeds to take root, Doolittle said.

Low water isn’t just a Lake Superior issue. Precipitation over the past 12 months remains below normal, and most lakes and streams from Duluth north in Northeastern Minnesota are very low, especially near the Ontario border. That area remains locked in an extreme drought, according to the National Drought Mitigation Center.

News Tribune staff writer Peter Passi and the Associated Press contributed to this story.

—–

To see more of the Duluth News-Tribune, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.DuluthSuperior.com.

Copyright (c) 2007, Duluth News-Tribune, Minn.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.