How’s the Lake Doing?

If you live on the shores of Lake Erie or any other body of water, you probably think about that environment’s health and how it can be improved or protected. But did you know that land management practices 50 or 100 miles away can still have an influence on the lake you see from your window? For example, land use and management near the Ohio-Indiana border, in the western reaches of the Maumee River watershed, can have an effect on the ecosystem of Maumee Bay halfway across the state.

Researchers at Ohio State University and Case Western Reserve University have received funding from the National Science Foundation for a four-year project to examine how practices in the watershed affect water quality in Lake Erie, and how people’s perceptions of the lake influence those practices. They hope to develop decision-making models that would help policy makers and watershed managers understand how guidelines and regulations are formed, and identify practices that both make sense for upstream activities and can improve the downstream ecosystem.