Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Lake Tahoe's clarity improves


Quick background:  California and Nevada's extremely famous Lake Tahoe is partly extremely famous because it has very clear water.  But over the past few decades, its vaunted supreme clarity has declined.  The main factors pointed to have been the increasing development around the lake, which has supposedly increased the amount of sediments and nutrients in the lake, so that both the suspended stuff in the lake and the plankton living in the lake have increased.

To find out more:  State of the Lake Report - 2014

So, the following article indicates that the lake is clearer this year, but not for a good reason -- it's clearer because the drought has limited the inflow of particulates and nutrients into Lake Tahoe.  So that's good, in a way.   But if the weather would go back to being as wet as it normally gets, the original problem would probably return.


No comments: