Chautauqua County, NY (WIVB) – owners of housing on Lake Chautauqua express concerns about the rapid weed growth that has taken the lake over the last few years.
In the fourth July, the weekend of Lomas’s family, which has a place on Lake Chautauka, said that the fourth July weekend is usually busy for the bay they are in.
“We had the boat last year. We had the children’s pipes in the lake. My grandson came out a jet ski in the lake and had a good time by ride the little ones,” said Nancy Lomas. “We didn’t do anything this weekend, none of that – I just couldn’t take out the boat. There were very few boats. If there were, they tried to get out of our bay.”
The Lomas family has been in a place in Burtis Bay for 26 years. Nancy said she tried to get the boat this weekend, but she clogged with weeds and began to overheat.
“When we bought it, there were some weeds, but it was nothing like that. I mean [it’s an] An absolute nightmare, ”said Stephen Lomas. – We were supported. Everyone sat and just looked at the growth of weeds. “
Potis Bay is the southern pool of Lake Chautauka, and Lomas are not the only homeowners in the bay who feel left in the weeds.
“Everything that the Association of the Association of Lake Chatauqua collects and shortens here,” says Lisa Masters, a homeowner in Burtis Bay. “Last year, the lake was perfect, the boat was clear, everything was great. This year it’s terrible.”
As of January 1, Burtis Bay is designated as a wet area.
What is the pollution of Lake Chautauqua and what is being done about it? Jefferson project update
“We want a healthy lake. We are not against the wetlands, but this is a developed area,” says Katie Janus, owner of a dwelling in the bay. “This makes no sense. Regulating the wetlands makes no sense for every small area of this lake. It has to change.”
Senator George Borelo believes that wetlands were not failure, saying that they had issued more herbicide permits this year than they had ever had.
“The fact that for the first time the Chautauqua Lake Association was required to obtain weed collection permits and did not, I think this is the main contribution to Burtiss Bay’s problems at the moment,” Borelo said.
“I was told that they were delayed this year as they could harvest this area, as there were herbicides attached to the area in the early and you have to wait until a period of time has passed before you can place any type of mechanical devices there,” says John Shede, Vice President of Campus institution at the institution.
Borrello believes that there should be more cooperation and more accountability for organizations working on the lake.
“The most toxic thing is not the harmful flowering of algae in Lake Chautauqua, it is the policy of all lake organizations that cannot be understood,” he said.
“There are many people who work to solve this and we all work in a rather coordinated effort,” Shed said. “It will just take a while. People have to have patience because it took hundreds of years to create this problem and we will have many years to solve it.”
Shed said there are a bunch of organizations working together for Lake Chautauqua, including the Alliance for the Constitutional Court, Jefferson’s Project, Decor, Engineers’ Army, researchers at Suny Fredonia, Bowling Green University and North Carolina.
“We are all working together. There are a bunch of organizations,” he said. “Most of us work under an organization called Chautauqua Lake Water Shead Alliance, which is a district entity that has advice and they provide funding through various grants for financing, countries and local funding.”
WIVB News 4 reached out to the Chautauqua Lake Association asking for an interview and at that time it was not heard from them.
Last local news
Hope Winter is a reporter and multimedia journalist who is part of the News 4 team of 2021. See more than her work hereS
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material cannot be published, emitted, rewritten or redistributed.
For the latest news, weather, sports and streaming video, focus on News 4 Buffalo.