Please join us for our semi annual cleanup of the shoreline, parks, beaches and memorials around Indian Lake! Goals for the day include: shoreline cleanup; picking up trash, branches, leaves; mowing/trimming; preparing flower beds for winter.

Volunteers will spread out to various neighborhood locations as needed: Morgan Park, Hapgood Brooks Memorial, Indian Lake Beach, Sears Island Causeway, Frostholm Memorial, Shore Park, Norton Drive.

Meet at Morgan Park at 9am. For more information, contact the Indian Lake Watershed Association at indianlakeboard@gmail.com

 

Cleanup flyer

The City of Worcester has contracted Solitude Lake Management to apply the herbicide glyphosate for the control of the Phragmites australis (Common Reed), which has been growing around the edges of Indian Lake. Phragmites is an aggressive invasive species that can fill in lakes, exclude native vegetation, and displace wildlife. While there are several methods to control Phragmites, treatment with glyphosate is one of the most effective and economical.

 

Glyphosate is a broad-spectrum systemic herbicide, meaning that it will kill the entirety of the plant (not just the foliage), significantly reducing the amount that comes back next year. Glyphosate functions by inhibiting the synthesis of an enzyme responsible for the production of several amino acids necessary for the building of essential metabolic proteins in the plant, thereby starving it. While this enzyme is found in many plants, animals do not have it. Rather, animals gain those amino acids from the consumption of plants. Glyphosate is therefore non-toxic to humans, and the Lake can remain open during the application.

 

Phragmites Info Sheet

The Worcester Cyanobacteria Monitoring Collaborative (WCMC) is a citizen scienc

	City of Worcester Environmental Analyst Jacquelyn Burmeister works with volunteers from Lake Quinsigamond to analyze water samples.

e program in which volunteers gather water samples using a plankton net once a month at Worcester waterways including Indian Lake, Patch Reservoir, Coes Reservoir, and Lake Quinsigamond. Volunteers then meet at Regatta Point at Lake Quinsigamond to examine the water samples under a microscope for cyanobacteria and microscopic critters.   

 

Important data is collected which will help representatives from the City of Worcester Lakes and Ponds Program establish processes for anticipating cyanobacteria blooms     .   

The Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) has been making many improvements statewide to manage stormwater management which is great news for our lakes and ponds. Rain and snow melt flows over impervious surfaces such as roads, washing nutrients, oils, trash and sediment into tributaries and nearby water bodies.

MassDOT has developed an Impaired Waters Program which assesses and provides mitigation for water bodies near state roads.

Representatives from MassDOT recently came to a Neighborhood Watch meeting to talk about the extensive Rt. 190 project near exit 1. As part of this discussion, we learned about statewide efforts to improve and protect our waterways and improvements which will benefit Indian Lake. 

Specifically for Indian Lake, MassDOT is currently constructing 14 stormwater infiltration practices along I-190 to treat discharges to both Indian Lake and an unnamed tributary that flows from the lake. There are 5 infiltration basins treating discharges to Indian Lake and 2 infiltration basins and 7 infiltration swale treating discharges to the unnamed tributary.  MassDOT has projected these stormwater management tools will treat 45 acres of highway and remove 43 lbs of phosphorus per year from the stormwater!

City of Worcester Calendar