\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cWe observed that there was a correlation between the quantity of phosphorus in the sediments and the thickness of the sediments. When there was more sediments, there was more phosphorus in it. They mostly accumulate where the current is really slow, so it\u2019s mostly in deeper areas where it\u2019s more than three meters deep,\u201d explained Ana\u00efs Renaud, biologist and project manager for Conservation Lac-Brome. \u201cThe other thing that we observed was that in 2022, the level of the phosphorus exceeded the critical threshold in more than half of the samples. (\u2026) The phosphorus in the sediments was 2.5 times more significant than in 2006 in some areas of the lake and it was more in the shallow areas.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Renaud, the study \u201ctell us that the lake is still vulnerable,\u201d despite the efforts of Conservation Lac-Brome, volunteers, and residents over the years to ensure the water quality of Brome Lake. She noted that phosphorus can come from streams, boats, and the shoreline.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are lots of activities around the lake, lots of residents, a lot of boats going on the lake. We should be very cautious about what we do on the lake and around the lake because our activities have a great impact and these impacts can be seen quickly,\u201d said Renaud. \u201cFor example, when we have big showers during the summer it\u2019s after these showers that we can see lots of blue green algae coming up. That tells us that there\u2019s lots of phosphorus coming from the shorelines that is brought into the lake by water runoff.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI think what we\u2019re seeing is that we got some stability with the phosphorus coming in from the watershed, that\u2019s good news, but the foot-side of that is that we still have a lot of phosphorus at the bottom of the lake. We\u2019re concerned about churn in the water bringing that back up,\u201d mentioned Joyce.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nJoyce added that phosphorus feeds the blue green algae and forms \u201ca pea soup\u201d at the top of the lake, which can be toxic to humans and animals.\u00a0 <\/span>The group\u2019s immediate concern is the growing popularity of the wake and wave boats, according to Joyce.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cThey displace a lot of water and if they\u2019re not out in the middle of the lake where there\u2019s five, six, seven meters of water underneath they can churn up the phosphorus that is in the sediments,\u201d he explained.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nJoyce and Renaud both emphasized that citizens and visitors need to play their part to help alleviate this pressure on the lake and to limit the amount of sediments going into the water to avoid further accumulation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cThe town has put out an excellent map that shows where you should use wake and wave boats. If people can restrict themselves to that area, that will do a lot to help make sure that we don\u2019t churn up the bottom,\u201d Joyce highlighted.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cEveryone should manage their runoff on their property and avoid fertilizers, that\u2019s something really important. Boaters should have eco-responsible practices, like navigating in deeper water and avoid following the shoreline,\u201d mentioned Renaud. \u201cThat\u2019s two good practices.\"<\/p>\n
Listen to the full interview below:<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Conservation Lac-Brome recently received funding from the Town of Brome Lake and the Ministry of Environment to launch its \u201cBlue Patrol\u201d project this summer with the goal of helping citizens and visitors adopt responsible behaviours to improve the quality of the water in Brome Lake and its ecosystems. \u201cThree students will knock on doors of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":113,"featured_media":126028,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[57,221,222],"tags":[4358,25629,26687,16878,15512,26686],"radio":[246],"origine":[274,259,260],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157755"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/113"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157755"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":158056,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157755\/revisions\/158056"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126028"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157755"},{"taxonomy":"radio","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/radio?post=157755"},{"taxonomy":"origine","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/origine?post=157755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}