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Lake Management Plan

Lac Courte Oreilles Lake Management Plan: Download here.

The Lac Courte Oreilles Lake Management Plan (the “LCO Plan”) was adopted by the COLA Board on April 22, 2011 and was subsequently approved by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (WDNR). The LCO Plan specifies long term water quality goals for big and little LCO that COLA intends to achieve by implementing eighteen (18) specific actions under five (5) broad lake management categories. The five lake management categories specified in the LCO Plan are:

  • Invasive Species Management
  • Lake and Stream Monitoring
  • LCO Shore Land Development and Buffer Area
  • Cranberry Discharges
  • Changing Land Use in the LCO Watershed

Since adopting the LCO Plan, COLA has worked to establish an organizational framework and recruit volunteers to begin the job of implementing the action items. COLA established the “Lake Management Plan Implementation Committee” to coordinate and oversee lake management action item implementation. The Committee is made up of a number of current COLA Board members and other COLA membership volunteers. COLA also hired Frank Pratt the former “Fish guy” who recently retired from the WDNR, to help coordinate and advance the work of the Committee.

The ten action items that COLA is currently implementing are:

  1. Work with Cranberry growers to eliminate discharges to LCO
  2. Evaluate feasibility of dredging/chemically treating Musky Bay to remove phosphorus (Presentation)
  3. Evaluate and make recommendations to form a “Lake Management District”
  4. Monitor and advance agricultural “best management practices” on farms within the direct drainage area of LCO
  5. Survey and establish shoreline buffer zones (Presentation)
  6. Survey big and little LCO septic systems and oversee follow up (Report) (Map)
  7. Ongoing treatment of curly leaf pond weed/AIS grant coordination (2014 report)
  8. Maintain the “Clean Boat” initiative
  9. Conduct “State of the Art” water quality and water flow monitoring
  10. Outreach to LCO watershed partners (2014 meeting)

COLA intends to keep the membership fully informed of the progress in implementing the Lac Courte Oreilles Lake Management Plan through regular updates action item by action item in the Loon Call and on the COLA web site. The COLA Board is convinced that through implementation of these action items we can be well on our way to achieving the water goals that we have set for these unique lakes.

Presentations:

COLA Water Quality Goals

Lake Management Plan Poster