| |||||||||||
Summertime in the BelgradesContentsfor Printing Article Summaries |
Gloeotrichia Echinulata — A Floating Scourge. (Photo © 2006, by Sarah Melvin)
As the Belgrade Lakes Association Board of Directors prepares for the group's annual meeting, one woman's research may be the motivation for the remediation of Great and Long Pond's bubble like Gloeotrichia, a blue-green algae that is really a bacteria.
The vernal pool is one of our most neglected and misunderstood water bodies. They are those (usually) small ponds that fill up with snowmelt or late winter rains but are dry by mid-August. Because they dry up, they do not support populations of fish. So what good are they?
When August rolls around in the north end of Great Pond, when children start secretively conferring about decorations and costumes, and when adults revel in recollections about clues, commodores, and "The Suitcase," it's all about an annual ritual that has reached its third generation of families in this Rome lakeside neighborhood.
The tide turns in Augusta and returns to the sea through Merrymeeting Bay. Here, the Kennebec, the Androscoggin, the Muddy, the Cathance, the Abagadassett, and the Eastern merge. Here, the waters of the Belgrades that start in East Pond and Salmon Lake and McGrath Pond and that join the Kennebec via Messalonskee Stream mingle with those of the Kennebec's other tributaries.
Last week my good friend and local guide John Hassam called and asked if I wanted to go fishing. John and I have been friends for quite a few years and are both blessed because we get to fish a lot — perhaps too much, depending on who you ask, like my wife, for example. Redisplay This Page in Printer-Friendly Format <-- Previous • Home • All 2006 Issues • Next --> | ||||||||||
