Many hands make light work. And for volunteers collecting and processing native seeds, it can be fun work, too!
On any given fall day, you can likely find volunteers collecting native seeds from a local prairie. For years, many organizations, including Clean Lakes Alliance, have offered this volunteer opportunity and encouraged people to join us in the prairie.
BY KIM MEYER, AGRONOMIST, DANE COUNTY LAND & WATER RESOURCES DEPARTMENT
Farmers have limited opportunities — approximately 40 over their lifetime — to explore new conservation practices. This makes change inherently risky as they often must wait until the following year for another chance. This reality underscores the effectiveness of farmer-led initiatives, where farmers collaboratively share knowledge and experiences to achieve common objectives, such as enhancing soil health while safeguarding water quality and ensuring farm profitability. Farmers have firsthand insight into the challenges associated with adopting new conservation methods.
Parks and lakes define Greater Madison, offering plenty of public beaches to enjoy the water’s edge. In fact, we have 22 public beaches and official swimming locations on the Yahara chain of lakes (and more throughout Dane County). Every summer, Public Health Madison & Dane County (PHMDC) monitors the majority of these beaches from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
Clean Lakes Alliance’s Watershed Programs Manager Caitlin McAleavey sat down with PHMDC’s Jennifer Lavender Braun and Ronesha Strozier to learn how they test the beaches and what determines if they are open or closed.
When rain gardens are added to our local landscape, they help manage stormwater, improve water quality, support biodiversity, and beautify outdoor spaces. You can create a rain garden — a shallow depression filled with native plants that capture runoff — relatively easily at your home or business. They don’t need to be located directly beside a lake to be beneficial to our waters. What happens on the lands surrounding the lakes can have a big impact on the lakes, too!
We extend our heartfelt gratitude for your support in ensuring that this year’s Clean Lakes Community Coffee was a resounding success! This cherished event, held every other year, serves as a platform to foster unity within our community, provide educational opportunities, and enhance awareness about the significance of our lakes. Your participation has truly made a difference in highlighting the importance of preserving and protecting this vital natural resource for current and future generations.
At this year’s Yahara Pride Farms’ conference, one message came out loud and clear: farmers are leading the way in conservation, but their stories too often go untold.
By Carolyn Betz, Project Manager and Lead Author of the Lake Waubesa Management Plan
Lake Waubesa Conservation Association and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources approved a comprehensive lake management plan in late 2024. The plan presents an up-to-date analysis of historical and current water quality data, the unique wetlands, and phosphorus inputs from rural and urban land uses. The plan presents dozens of recommendations to protect and improve the lake.
Thank you for helping make the 2025 Frozen Assets Festival and 5K Run, Walk, and Skate one of the best ever! Throughout the week, Frozen Assets not only brought the community together, but it also educated people and raised awareness for our number one asset – the lakes!
Clean Lakes Alliance’s LakeForecast water quality monitoring program completed its 12th season in 2024. This program is entirely volunteer-implemented, with over 100 trained monitors assessing water quality conditions from nearshore and offshore locations across all five Yahara lakes (Mendota, Monona, Wingra, Waubesa, and Kegonsa). From Memorial Day through Labor Day, volunteers recorded water clarity, air and water temperature, waterfowl presence, the extent of floating plant debris, and the severity of green algae and cyanobacteria at public beaches, lakeside parks, and private piers. Submitted data can be seen in real-time on Lakeforecast.org or our free app, allowing the public to stay up to date on current lake conditions.
Ice on! Cold nighttime temperatures, combined with cold water and light winds, helped Lake Mendota officially freeze on December 25, 2024, as declared by the Wisconsin State Climatology Office. Two days later, on December 27th, Lake Mendota reopened as high temperatures climbed well into the 40s. The largest lake in the Yahara Watershed froze for the first time in the 2024-2025 winter season just five days after December 20th, which is the median ice-on date for Lake Mendota. The latest date ice-on has been declared is January 30th, and that took place in 1932.
