High E. Coli counts
Forty-one public beaches in Ohio are under E. Coli contamination advisories, 29 on Lake Erie. That means they recently have tested higher than the state's safety threshold of 235 colonies of E. Coli per 100 milliliters. Lakes in our region under an advisory:
Lake ……………..……. E. Coli count …. Sample date
Caesar Creek Lake …….. 1,410 ………………… June 30
Lake Loramie ……………. 866 ………………….. June 29
Hueston Woods ………… 461 …………………… June 30
Madison Lake ……………. 350 …………………. June 24
Cowan Lake ………………. 272 …………………. June 30
Source: Ohio Department of Health
Ohio’s beaches will be busy this Fourth of July weekend, but swimmers beware: The water could make you sick.
Three of every 10 public beaches in Ohio are under E. coli advisories this week, including popular area destinations such as Caesar Creek Lake, Hueston Woods, Lake Loramie and Cowan Lake.
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources tests the water at 134 beaches every other week during the swimming season and posts recreational public health advisories if E. coli levels are high. The state’s safety threshold is 235 colonies per 100 milliliters of water.
“This weekend people want to be more aware. I can’t think of in the recent past a June where we’ve had this many spikes in E. coli,” said Brian Miller, Southwest District manager for the Ohio Division of Parks & Recreation.
“We’ve set a lot of records for rainfall in June and that has a huge impact bringing that bacteria into the lakes.”
An advisory means the level of bacteria has reached unsafe levels and could make swimmers sick, according to the state. Children, the elderly and those with weakened immune systems are advised not to swim during an advisory.
The public can view all sampling results at the Ohio Department of Health's "Beachguard" web site.
Caesar Creek Lake southeast of Waynesville had the highest E. coli level of any lake in the region. The water in the northern part of the lake tested at 1,410 colonies this week — the lake’s highest reading in four years.
But Caesar Creek’s south beach tested at 96, well below the state’s danger line.
“The lake has been recharged. With the lake filling back up, it’s really inexplainable why the E. coli would be so high,” said Chris Rapenchuk, the U.S. Corps of Engineers state park manager at Caesar Creek, which has 283 camp sites. “We’re overcapacity now. We got those rain events and flushed in all fresh water.”
Rapenchuk said construction of the new marina at the deep lake is far enough along that water levels — which reach 140-to-150 feet in some spots — no longer have to be lowered.
Sewage adds bacteria
Miller, who is based at Grand Lake St. Marys, blames the E. coli problem on heavy rains, stressed sewage systems and geese.
“When you get lake levels as high as what we’ve seen, this overwhelms the sewer systems around the lakes,” Miller said. “They can’t handle all that water, so it’s not unusual to see a sewer system that is being taxed.”
Miller stressed that E. coli levels change quickly, sometimes for the better. For example, the high reading at Grand Lake on June 15 was 648. It was 325 a week later and a much safer 101 this week.
“E. coli samples are a snapshot in time, on that Monday or Tuesday morning when the water sample gets pulled,” he said. “So when people come out on a Friday, Saturday or Sunday that level could be totally different. But we want to use caution on any body of water. The biggest thing with the E. coli is that we don’t ingest the water.”
Geese can also skew the readings.
“If geese decide to stay on that beach the night before you pull that sample, you’ll definitely have a high E. coli,” Miller said.
Indian Lake in Logan County, Kiser Lake in Champaign County and Buck Creek State Park in Springfield were among the lakes to test at a safe level for bacteria.
Unusual at Loramie
Lake Loramie near Minster usually doesn’t have to deal with advisories. It had just one last year but this year has been under an E. coli advisory since June 15, when its water tested at 1,732 colonies.
Lake Loramie State Park manager Jason Whitman said heavy rains led to a record high water level at the spillway. The shallow lake turns over its water supply monthly, draining on the west side.
“I think a lot of it is due to high water and change in turbidity, and the geese don’t help,” Whitman said.
Randy Sparklin, president of Lake Loramie Improvement Association, has lived on the lake for 20-plus years. He said it’s usually clean, and stayed that way even when boaters based at Grand Lake began coming to Loramie.
“When people up there were fearful of the problems, they would come down here and people expressed concern about whether there was contamination from that,” Sparklin said. “Everybody’s been assured from the state that it wasn’t a concern.
“It’s a totally different environment here than Grand Lake. We don’t have over development and our water turnover is a lot more rapid.”
Toxins in Grand Lake
The state also posts warning signs at beaches if toxin levels in algae blooms exceed recommended levels, which has been the case at Grand Lake for most of the year. Algae blooms, which can be toxic, are tested only after their presence is visually confirmed.
Grand Lake’s microcystin level spiked at 106 parts-per-billion on May 6. It was down to 64 this week at the public water supply intake at Celina. For microcystin, a toxin that can exist in algae blooms, Ohio’s threshold to post an advisory is 6 ppb.
Mike Sudman, supervisor of Celina’s water treatment plant since 2002, is in charge of a plant that spends about $1 million annually to convert toxin-laced water to safe drinking water. He says he takes his job “one day at a time.”
“Back in 2010 we had that huge layer that covered the whole lake in that blue-green (algae) and we haven’t seen it since,” he said. “It’d be easier to treat if it was a little cleaner, but I’ve been here 18 years and the water quality coming into the plant really hasn’t changed a whole lot.”
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