Reservoir benefits from missing state?s algae warning list

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Marion Reservoir has been strangely absent of late from the state?s list of high-profile lakes and reservoirs.

But the park rangers who carry on the day-to-day functions and services at the lake couldn?t be happier.

For the past several summers, Marion Reservoir has been a regular on the Kansas Department of Health and Environment?s list of state reservoirs and lakes afflicted with blue-green algae blooms.

This year, the reservoir went off the list of public warnings and advisories in mid-July?and hasn?t been listed since.

Although the reservoir office didn?t have statistical proof, Ranger Torrey Hett believes being off the warning list had a positive impact on lake use during the summer tourist season.

?I think it was more of a busier summer than what we have seen in years when there?s been a bloom for a couple of months,? Hett said.

He credited a couple of the big rains in June, plus a lower than usual number of 100-degree days, as the primary reasons for the change.

?A combination of a lot of the rain diluted the water, and the cooler weather,? he said. ?We always have the potential for a new bloom to occur with the right conditions, but I think we were able to dodge those this year.?

One reason Hett said he was hesitant to make a confident declaration that lake visits were up this summer is because a couple of other weather-related issues had a detrimental impact.

?The lake of blue-green algae blooms did bring in more customers, but we also dealt with campsites closed due to flood waters,? he said.

?Then we had the (Labor Day) windstorm damage and had to shut the parks down for I think a couple of weeks to get trees cut down and everything that was damaged from that.?

Another factor that may have drawn visitors to the lake was the opening of the new campsite area in the Cottonwood Point development.

?We had a small portion of it open last summer,? Hett said. ?But from the phone calls I?ve gotten here at the office, it seems like people are interested in having the campsites that have electric, water and sewer at the individual sites.?

Warmer-than-usual temperatures during the first two months of fall have kept visitors coming, Hett said, but the high-tourism season is generally over for this year.

?We?ll still have quite a few people that are traveling through and stop by to camp for a couple of nights,? he said. ?But we are at the end of our season here as far as busy busyness.?

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