Lake Monitoring

Partnerships

LakeWatch Program

LICA has partnered with the Alberta Lake Management Society (ALMS) since 2015 to conduct LakeWatch, a participatory water quality monitoring program for select lakes in the LICA Region. LICA’s contribution to the ALMS LakeWatch program is made possible by funding provided by LICA’s Industry Partners.

LakeWatch has several important objectives, one of which is to collect and interpret water quality data on Alberta Lakes. Equally important is educating lake users about their aquatic environment, encouraging public involvement in lake management, and facilitating cooperation and partnerships between government, industry, the scientific community, and lake users (Alberta Lake Management Society, 2024). 

The following parameters are assessed and analyzed as part of the LakeWatch program.

Water Chemistry Metals Invasive Species Water Clarity
Total Phosphorus (μg/L) Aluminum (μg/L) Dreissenid mussels Euphotic Depth (m)
Total Kjeldahl Nitrogen (mg/L) Arsenic (μg/L) Spiny water flea Lake Profile Depth (m)
Chlorophyll – a (μg/L) Boron (μg/L) Eurasian watermilfoil
Microcystin (μg/L) Selenium (μg/L)

Volunteers make the LakeWatch program possible by providing and operating their boats and assisting the LakeWatch technicians with sampling procedures.
Thank you, LakeWatch Volunteers!

Lake Summary Reports

LakeWatch reports are completed after each sample season to concisely summarize the key parameters of the LICA region lakes. Reports can be viewed at the link below. These reports are simply meant to contextualize the lakes in the LICA Region and are not necessarily a comparison of lake health. More comprehensive water quality reports are available for each individual lake with data collected on the ALMS Website (https://alms.ca/reports/).