Low lake level gives vegetation a chance to grow
- Katrina Elsken Lake Okeechobee News
- Jun 9
- 2 min read
WEST PALM BEACH – Lake Okeechobee has been below 12 feet (above sea level) since April 15. At the June 5 meeting of the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) Governing Board, scientists were hopeful the lake low will stay below 12 feet for the full 90-day target.
In December, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers started a “recovery” schedule for the big lake, with the goal of getting the lake below 12 feet for 90 days or below 11.5 feet for 60 days. The lower lake level is needed for sunlight to reach the lake bottom and new submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) to sprout. It is also important that when the lake level starts rising, the ascension is gradual. If the water rises faster than the plants can grow, new SAV could be damaged or lost.
“If the lake stays low for another 30 days, and then slowly rises during the wet season, the submerged aquatic vegetation will have a chance to recover,” said Newton Cook of United Waterfowlers. It won’t happen in one year, he cautioned. The lake needs three to five years within the ecological envelope for the vegetation to recover.
“Mother Nature will decide what happens,” he predicted.
“We need a management committee on Lake Okeechobee,” Cook added. “It’s a very complex system. All the different agencies should be on that committee.”
“Lake Okeechobee is a little over 11 feet. We entered into this recovery mode in order to regain our SAV,” said Scott Martin of Anglers for Lake Okeechobee.
“The SAV is the filter for Lake Okeechobee,” Martin said. As of right now, I see zero SAV recovery. I am still optimistic that if we stay low for the next 30 days we will get some. but I am afraid we will lose it when the water comes back up.
“The good news is we have hard bottom now,” he continued. “The only good thing high water did was it washed out a lot of the littoral zone.
“What disappoints me is we don’t hear restoration projects inside Lake O. There is no current project inside of Lake Okeechobee being done/ Let’s get projects inside of Lake Okeechobee.
“We are spending billions of dollars on projects, east, west, north and south of Lake Okeechobee,” Martin said. “Why aren’t we spending on projects inside of Lake Okeechobee to bring back the 50,000 -- 60,000 -- 70,000 acres of SAV we used to have to clean that water?”
