(WNY News Now) – Mayville, NY – In a groundbreaking event, Chautauqua Lake witnesses the dawn of a new era in scientific advancement aimed at tackling its longstanding challenges.
The spring bloom is bringing with it major advancements in Chautauqua Lake’s science towards
solutions approach. A diverse crowd of project partners and stakeholders gathered on the banks
of Mud Creek in Mayville on Monday, April 29, 2024 to celebrate the unveiling of a new stream
monitoring network. The Mud Creek station is one of six constructed as part of the research
partnership between The Jefferson Project and Chautauqua Institution, which began working on
Chautauqua Lake in 2020. Taking and adapting its blueprint from ten years of work on Lake
George, The Jefferson Project has rolled out its Chautauqua program in several stages. The latest
step in this rollout is the construction of six tributary stations, which will collect important
information about the waters feeding our lake. Stations are scheduled to be operational this year
on Dewittville, Mud, Prendergast, Ball, Bemus, and Goose Creeks, while a seventh station will
monitor flow in the Chadakoin River. Stantec Consulting Services has served as the technical lead
during the construction process, and TimberHut Cabin Company of Great Valley provided the
pre-fabricated structure of the stations.
Monday’s event was introduced by Chautauqua Lake and Watershed Management Alliance
Executive Director Randall Perry, and included remarks from representatives of the many
different organizations that have made this expansion of research possible. “We are very
honored to have people from across the spectrum,” Perry said. “We’ve got governmental
leadership, philanthropic leadership, we have scientific and engineering leadership from not just
The Jefferson Project team and the core group that built this but from across the scientific fields
and stakeholder fields. It takes all of us.”
Following Perry’s introduction, Institution President Dr. Michael Hill spoke about the inception
of the partnership with The Jefferson Project, and the progress that has been made to develop
science-based solutions to the impairments we face on Chautauqua Lake. “It is amazing to thinkthat when completed, Chautauqua Lake will be one of only two fully computerized lakes in the
world,” said Hill. “Through a system of sensors and measuring devices tied to (weather) events,
modeling computer systems created by IBM, Chautauqua Lake in our backyard is on the forefront
of some of the most advanced freshwater lake research technology in the nation. Which is just
stunning to think about.”
Funding for this project was provided by the Ralph C. Sheldon Foundation via an Alliance pass-
thru grant that was secured in the summer of 2023. “The Sheldon Foundation has long supported and been concerned about the health of Chautauqua Lake,” Executive Director Linda Swanson
said. “We had an unusual opportunity last year to give a pretty significant gift for our foundation,
and we remain committed to the future. All along this was the missing link to the (nutrient)
budget of the lake. We made great strides with the scientific work that was done in-lake, and just
didn’t really know what was happening with the water coming from the tributaries. Now we will
have the technology to do that.”
County Executive PJ Wendel took the opportunity to look back at the many different pieces of
funding and community collaboration that have been necessary to get to this point. “It’s a great
community partnership, Brooks Anderson owner of TimberHut has been a longtime friend of
mine,” Wendel said. “A unity of effort is a phrase that I have been following when it comes to
Chautauqua Lake, and that is going to continue. We need to work together. We now are working
with the state, which is a great partner, but we need more. So we are going to continue this effort
together, we are going to continue to bring the science, and we are going to push to make that
healthy lake one of the smartest lakes in the United States.”
Philip Gow, representing Congressman Nick Langworthy, and George Fillgrove, representing state
Senator George Borrello, offered congratulations to all those involved with the project and
expressed support for the expansion of projects helping to improve Chautauqua Lake. Following
statements by local stakeholders, members of the construction and research teams took to the
microphone to explain in detail how these stations were built and their operation. Speakers
included Dwight Harrienger and Rose Richelsen of Stantec, as well as Vince Moriarty and Mike
Kelly of IBM Research and The Jefferson Project. “I want to not forget to thank the landowners
who have agreed to have stream stations placed on their property,” Harrienger said. During the
site selection process, Harrienger and his team worked with property owners to secure locations
for the stations at each major tributary. Environmental sustainability has also been an important
goal during this project, and the stations have been designed to be mobile and leave minimal
impacts at each site. “The farthest pipe from us right now is holding what we call a sonde,” said
Richelsen. “Which is just a large instrument that will take different water quality parameters, it
will take those measurements.” While stream sampling has been done in the watershed in the
past, these new stations have the capability to measure several different water quality variables
instantaneously. The sondes described in detail by Richelsen are able to measure things like
temperature, flow, and salt content and store that data for future computer modeling. The
stations can also directly pull water samples remotely for further analysis during storm events,
and are equipped with weather stations. Once again following the model of their research on
Lake George, these facilities are operated by a computer control panel running specialized
software. Data streams from each of these control panels are brought together in an
environmental model that has been developed by IBM Research.
“It is a very custom interface. So every single one of these sensors we write custom software, we
are then running it on our computer in that box,” said Moriarty. “Adaptive sampling is when we
take sensor data, take model data, and decide when we want to take a sample. So if the sensors
say hey, there is a lot of chloride (salt) coming through right now, we can take a sample right now
or take ten samples and get a whole range.”
Moriarty explained that observations from Lake George indicate a large amount of the chloride
entering that lake can often be traced to a relatively small number of weather events. That is the
type of scientific insight that is made possible by the adaptive sampling that will now be taking
place in the Chautauqua watershed. “This stream station, this is all well and good. If it was here
by itself it would be great,” said Kelly. “As Vince mentioned, it is talking to a bunch of other what
we call endpoints. Other environmental measurement stations. It’s not really about this stream,
it is about the lake.” Kelly indicated that the main goals of this research program can be summed
up with three questions: Where are the nutrients coming from? If it is from streams, how does
that water enter the lake? How does that nutrient-laden water then interact with the ecosystem?
“This stream station is going to help us answer the first two questions,” Kelly said.
For more information about this project and others, please contact Alliance Communications Coordinator Jay Young at jyoung@chautauquaalliance.org or 716-661-8918.
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