What's up with Silver Lake?

Why are you doing this?

As part of the curriculum of a UNH course entitled "A Multi-Disciplinary Approach to Lake Management" we have been assigned a project involving the development of future management considerations and suggestions for Silver Lake of Hollis. Sound complicated? Well, it is! But you can help, read on!

The foremost problem facing Silver Lake is that no government or private environmental organization takes responsibility for managing Silver Lake as a whole! The Silver Lake State Park monitors for E. coli bacteria and any algal scums along the beach, but no long term sampling is being conducted in the rest of the lake.  This means that any problems encountered in other parts of the lake proceed unchecked. That's bad. But that's why you're here, right? You want to learn more and maybe even help!

The scientific sounding problem:
Silver Lake is prone to seasonal algae blooms. What's that mean? It means that as light, temperature, and nutrient availability changes with the season, more and more algae grows in the lake.

One of the types of algae that grows in Silver Lake is called Microcystis aeruginosa. Microcystis has been known to produce toxic microcystins. Long term exposure to microcystins in high quantities have been found to cause liver damage, gastroenteritis in children, and primary liver cancer.

No! As long as you're not scooping water up from the lake and drinking it every day, you'll be fine. LONG TERM exposure to VERY HIGH levels of microcystin can be cause for concern. Short term exposure will neither cause cancer nor kill you in any other way. But microcystins are worrysome for other reasons too, besides being toxic to humans, they are toxic to other aquatic organisms like bivalves (mussels) and waterfowl.