Winter 2002 | Winter 2000 | Summer 2000

Membership is a Must

The BLIA traditionally has been comprised of approximately 100 households around Beaver Lake. In recent years, this membership level has been successfully sustained through annual door-to-door membership drives and mailings. This year, our membership has fallen by approximately 20 households, which limits the Associations ability to accomplish its goals.

Often, membership and member involvement in our association increases when there are scandals, troubling issues, or threats to our community. Thankfully, there has been no high profile crisis affecting our lake. The BLIA has been working diligently to make sure that this remains the case.

Lightning has struck many New Hampshire Lakes in the form of milfoil. Milfoil is an exotic weed that takes over shallow lakes and renders them useless for recreational activity. As this epidemic sweeps through the northeast, the BLIA is aggressively educating boaters, establishing weed watcher programs, and is participating in the Watershed Stewardship Program. It is through these efforts that we prevent the very circumstances that might heighten our membership enrollment. As the board members and volunteers continue their daily effort to keep our lake crisis free, your financial help is needed. If you have enjoyed the benefits of spring clean-up day, family day, the lake yard sale, our newsletters, monthly water testing, our annual meeting, or other special events, please become a dues paying member today. Even if you do not participate in any of our events, the peace of mind that we are at work protecting Beaver Lake should be enough to encourage your enrollment.

Please check to see if you have paid dues for the 1999/2000 fiscal year. If you haven't, please forward your $20 membership dues to P.O. Box 133, East Derry, NH. More importantly, if you would like to be more involved in BLIA activities or would like to serve on our board, please call me at 432-3375. Through strong membership and active volunteers, we can keep our lake crisis free.

Bill Caselden
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By Rob Tompkins
based on facts provided by Jody Connor
and Stephanie Bowser,
NH Department of Environmental Services

Are things really better?

In the early 80's, through the cooperation of the BLIA, UNH and NHDES, many lake quality samples were analyzed. Based on its water chemistry and biology, Beaver Lake was trophically rated as Eutrophic. Eutrophication is the process of increased nutrient input resulting in higher biological productivity. This was occurring for many reasons although the major cause was unregulated development. For the past fifteen years many people have spent a great deal of time and money working to improve the water quality of Beaver Lake. Using town of Derry resources, State and Federal funds and, of course, ten thousand dollars from three hundred residents of the lake area, sewerage was installed and Best Management Practices were put into place.

The question now is "Are Things Really Better?"
The answer is an enthusiastic, but qualified "yes." DES is in the final stages of a Lake Assessment Survey, which was requested by the BLIA. Complete data will not be available until after the winter data is collected. Our friend, Jody Connor, of DES, has given us a preliminary analysis of the data and compared it to lake survey data from '77, '84, '85 and '99. The news is actually quite good.

For Beaver Lake to move up one lake classification, to Mesotrophic, would be quite an accomplishment. Many signs point to this happening, but according to Jody, we are not ready to make that claim yet.

Surface phosphorus, which is the major culprit in such things as algal blooms, has decreased dramatically from 18 ug/L to 9 ug/L. Also, internal Phosphorus load from the sediment shows a decrease. This is probably the greatest payoff from the town sewerage purchase. Obviously, not having bad septic systems leaching into the lake has had a major effect on water quality.

Chlorophyll-a, which is used as an indication of algae abundance, peaked in 1984 and has shown a steady decline since. Mean chlorophyll-a for a NH lake is 7.32 mg/m3. Beaver Lake was 4.57 last summer.

The most dramatic measure of lake quality has been the obvious increase in clarity, or Secchi disk transparency. 1999 was a great year for increased lake clarity in general because of lack of rain. 1998 was a very bad year, if you remember, because of the plethora of rain. Although, we need one more year of transparency data to statistically validate most people's observation, Beavers transparency numbers are in the Mesotrophic range and improving.

The other obvious improvement in the lake is the reduction in the number of weeds. The DES survey shows that the number of aquatic plants is dramatically reduced.

Beaver Lake still has a huge problem with a lack of dissolved oxygen, which is vital to bottom dwelling organisms as well as fish and amphibians. The deficiency is caused by the bacterial decomposition of organic materials on the lake bottom.

What does all this mean? It means that things are better, but that we are not done yet. Beaver Lake is still a very delicate environment that will always need our attention. I anxiously await the final outcome of the DES Lake Survey. I feel the news will be very encouraging.


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During the summer of '99, a group of lake residents petitioned the Department of Safety to ban ski-craft on Beaver Lake. Ski-craft is a type of personal watercraft, defined by legislation, that enabled the Department of Safety to administratively ban their use on certain lakes. Ski-craft are "motorized watercraft less than 13ft, which carry not more than the operator and one other person and can exceed 20 mph".

Pointing to the size and depth of the lake as well as environmental concerns, the petitioners presented their case at a public hearing. Residents attending the hearing spoke both in favor and against the ban. The opposition indicated that properly enforced speed limits on the lake would largely address the safety concerns and that jet-skis did not effect lake water quality any more than powerboats.

The BLIA did not initiate or sponsor the petition but did support the ban at the hearing. This support resulted from a member survey conducted by the Board of Directors during 1999, which enthusiastically supported a jet-ski ban.

After weighing the evidence presented at the hearing, the Department of Safety awarded the petitioners' request to ban jet-skis. A subsequent appeal of the decision was denied. As a result, one and two person Ski-craft can no longer be legally operated on Beaver Lake.


New Seasonal Dock Notification Rules

As of January 1, 2000 NH DES Wetlands Bureau has instituted a new, streamlined process for permitting seasonal docks. Information is available at www.des.state.nh.us/wetlands or by calling Wetlands at 271-2147. The new notification forms are available at the Town Clerks office. Some major changes have been made to the existing dock regulations. Although you still must have "at least 75 ft. of shoreline frontage" and must be "located at least 20 ft. from abutting property lines," you may now have a dock 6 ft. wide by 30 ft. long.
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It's time we take advantage of the information-sharing value of the internet. The board of directors are working on plans for our web-site which will be produced free-of-charge by Web-sites.com, a Derry web-site development firm owned by lake residents Eric Carlson and Judy Bridge.

Evidently there are a lot of Beaver Lakes around! The first step was to secure a domain name. Beaverlake.com (Fayetteville, AR), Beaver-Lake.com (Washington,DC), BeaverLake.net (Franklin, NJ), and BeaverLake.org (Issaquah, WA) were all taken. So we settled for www.beaver-lake.org. The "org" suffix designates a non-profit organization, so it suits us well.

The next step is to decide what kind of online information residents would find useful. This will be an ongoing process that will continue to develop as time goes on.

To begin with, a calendar showing the schedule of Upcoming Events as well as Featured News/Articles will be available. We thought it would be entertaining to have a photo gallery. News from the Board of Directors' meetings posted throughout the year would allow residents to read what's going on from month to month.

Wherever we go with the site, it will be fun and informative along the way.

Contact Eric or Judy at www.web-sites.com
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When I was asked by Bill Caselden to write an article for this winters newsletter regarding milfoil, I had to think long and hard about what to write.

It seems that all of the information the state has about milfoil we've already sent to our residents and yet it baffles me that still so many people are in the dark about the impact this little weed could have on all of us.

So, rather than beat a dead horse, I thought I'd just bottom line it. Here are the facts, and here is how it could affect you and your family.

* Last time I wrote, milfoil was found in 28 waterbodies throughout NH. To date Milfoil has taken hold of 36 waterbodies!!

* Milfoil is IMPOSSIBLE to eradicate once established.

* Milfoil can quickly inhabit valuable shoreline, impairing recreational activities. If Beaver Lake were to get milfoil, that section of our already small lake would be roped off and UNUSABLE!!

* Since milfoil spreads through fragmentation, it is not unlikely that milfoil could spread through our ENTIRE lake virtually making all boating activities and swimming IMPOSSIBLE!

* YOUR HOME'S VALUE WILL DECREASE! Yep, that's right folks,think about it. Who wants to live on a lake that is infested with milfoil? Any realtor that specializes in lake front properties can tell you which lakes already have it, and the ones that don't right now are MUCH more desirable! As a matter of fact, we'll be sending you a testimonial from one new resident of Beaver Lake who moved here to GET AWAY from a milfoil infested lake.

* IT WILL COST YOU MONEY. Currently the state will only pay for the FIRST treatment, after that, it is up to the homeowners, and residents of the town to fund subsequent treatments (the state only matches dollar per dollar) It costs thousands of dollars to manage and again is IMPOSSIBLE to eradicate once established.

So there are the facts! Watch your mailbox for valuable information on what YOU can do to help keep Beaver Lake MILFOIL FREE!