Vancouver Lake is located just west of
Vancouver, Washington
Vancouver is a city on the north bank of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington, located in Clark County. Incorporated in 1857, Vancouver has a population of 190,915 as of the 2020 census, making it the fourth-largest city in Was ...
, United States, north of the
Columbia River
The Columbia River (Upper Chinook: ' or '; Sahaptin: ''Nch’i-Wàna'' or ''Nchi wana''; Sinixt dialect'' '') is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river rises in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, C ...
and
Portland, Oregon
Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous co ...
, south of
Ridgefield, Washington
Ridgefield is a city in northern Clark County, Washington. The population was 10,319 at the time of the 2020 census, up from 4,763 in 2010, making it the fastest growing city in the state of Washington.
Located within the Portland metropolitan ...
, and the
Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge
Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge is a wildlife refuge, one of the national wildlife refuges operated by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, located in the westernmost part of Clark County, Washington. The refuge protects more than o ...
.
The lake is shallow, with a maximum depth of and a mean depth of less than . There is an island in the northern half of the lake named Turtle Island. The island was formed from the tailings of an
Army Corps of Engineers dredging
Dredging is the excavation of material from a water environment. Possible reasons for dredging include improving existing water features; reshaping land and water features to alter drainage, navigability, and commercial use; constructing da ...
project, which dredged around the perimeter of the lake in the early 1980s.
Lake River
Lake River is a tributary, about long, of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington. River miles are marked and numbered on the relevant map quadrangles: Vancouver, Ridgefield, and St. Helens. It flows north from Vancouver Lake in Vancou ...
flows from the north shore to the Columbia River near Ridgefield. Due to seasonal variation in relative river and lake levels, Lake River experiences intermittent flow reversal and flows ''into'' Vancouver Lake for considerable periods of time.
The sources for Vancouver Lake's water include a flushing channel (equipped with
tidal gates to control flows) from the Columbia River near the southwest shoreline and
Burnt Bridge Creek on the eastern shoreline, which winds about through many of the city's residential areas. Until the 1980s, this creek was neglected and a major source of
pollution
Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause adverse change. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the ...
for the lake.
Lower River Road leads west out of Vancouver to a park on the shore of Vancouver Lake which includes a large swimming area. A trail leads to Frenchman's Bar Park on the nearby Columbia River.
Natural history
A study published in 2014by Curt D.Peterson, et al, PSU Dept of Geology, includes results from multiple core samples which demonstrate there's been a lake in this location continuously going back at least 4000 years.
Vancouver Lake is home to a variety of wildlife species, many of which it shares with the nearby
Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge
Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge is a wildlife refuge, one of the national wildlife refuges operated by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, located in the westernmost part of Clark County, Washington. The refuge protects more than o ...
. Descriptions from the late 19th century describe Vancouver Lake as clear, up to deep and containing
sturgeon
Sturgeon is the common name for the 27 species of fish belonging to the family Acipenseridae. The earliest sturgeon fossils date to the Late Cretaceous
The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretace ...
. Current turbidity, more shallow depths and a lack of aquatic plant structures have diminished the variety of species and more recent surveys showed the most abundant fish by mass were
brown bullhead
The brown bullhead (''Ameiurus nebulosus'') is a fish of the family Ictaluridae that is widely distributed in North America. It is a species of bullhead catfish and is similar to the black bullhead (''Ameiurus melas'') and yellow bullhead (''Ame ...
, white
crappie
Crappies () are two species of North American freshwater fish of the genus ''Pomoxis'' in the family Centrarchidae (sunfishes). Both species of crappies are popular game fish among recreational anglers.
Etymology
The genus name ''Pomoxis'' ...
, black crappie, and
common carp
The Eurasian carp or European carp (''Cyprinus carpio''), widely known as the common carp, is a widespread freshwater fish of eutrophic waters in lakes and large rivers in Europe and Asia.Fishbase''Cyprinus carpio'' Linnaeus, 1758/ref>Arkive The ...
, with a few juvenile
salmonid
Salmonidae is a family of ray-finned fish that constitutes the only currently extant family in the order Salmoniformes . It includes salmon (both Atlantic and Pacific species), trout (both ocean-going and landlocked), chars, freshwater whitefis ...
s and a population of
channel catfish
The channel catfish (''Ictalurus punctatus'') is North America's most numerous catfish species. It is the official fish of Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, and Tennessee, and is informally referred to as a "channel cat". In the United States, the ...
,
largemouth bass
The largemouth bass (''Micropterus salmoides'') is a carnivorous freshwater gamefish in the Centrarchidae ( sunfish) family, a species of black bass native to the eastern and central United States, southeastern Canada and northern Mexico, but ...
,
bluegill
The bluegill (''Lepomis macrochirus''), sometimes referred to as "bream", "brim", "sunny", or "copper nose" as is common in Texas, is a species of North American freshwater fish, native to and commonly found in streams, rivers, lakes, ponds and ...
,
pumpkinseed
The pumpkinseed (''Lepomis gibbosus''), also referred to as pond perch, common sunfish, punkie, sunfish, sunny, and kivver, is a small/medium-sized North American freshwater fish of the genus ''Lepomis'' (true sunfishes), from family Centrarchi ...
,
yellow perch
The yellow perch (''Perca flavescens''), commonly referred to as perch, striped perch, American perch, American river perch or preacher is a freshwater perciform fish native to much of North America. The yellow perch was described in 1814 by Samu ...
, naturalized
goldfish
The goldfish (''Carassius auratus'') is a freshwater fish in the family Cyprinidae of order Cypriniformes. It is commonly kept as a pet in indoor aquariums, and is one of the most popular aquarium fish. Goldfish released into the wild have ...
,
northern pikeminnow
The Northern pikeminnow, Columbia River dace or formerly Squawfish (''Ptychocheilus oregonensis'') is a large member of the minnow family, Leuciscidae. This predatory freshwater fish is native to northwestern North America, ranging from the Nass ...
,
American shad
The American shad (''Alosa sapidissima'') is a species of anadromous clupeid fish naturally distributed on the North American coast of the North Atlantic, from Newfoundland to Florida, and as an introduced species on the North Pacific coast. The ...
,
mosquito fish
The western Mosquitofish (''Gambusia affinis'') is a North American freshwater fish, also known commonly, if ambiguously, as simply Mosquitofish or by its generic name, ''Gambusia'', or by the common name gambezi. Its sister species, the east ...
,
largescale sucker
The largescale sucker (''Catostomus macrocheilus'') is a species of sucker, a type of freshwater fish, found in western North America.
Description
It has a rounded snout with a downturned mouth on its underside (as opposed to a mouth at end of t ...
, and
freshwater sculpin. Rich fringe environments provide habitat for
amphibian
Amphibians are tetrapod, four-limbed and ectothermic vertebrates of the Class (biology), class Amphibia. All living amphibians belong to the group Lissamphibia. They inhabit a wide variety of habitats, with most species living within terres ...
s such as
tree frog
A tree frog (or treefrog) is any species of frog that spends a major portion of its lifespan in trees, known as an arboreal state. Several lineages of frogs among the Neobatrachia have given rise to treefrogs, although they are not closely relat ...
s,
reptile
Reptiles, as most commonly defined are the animals in the class Reptilia ( ), a paraphyletic grouping comprising all sauropsids except birds. Living reptiles comprise turtles, crocodilians, squamates (lizards and snakes) and rhynchocephalians ( ...
s such as
garter snake
Garter snake is a common name for generally harmless, small to medium-sized snakes belonging to the genus ''Thamnophis'' in the family Colubridae. Native to North and Central America, species in the genus ''Thamnophis'' can be found from the sub ...
s and a wide variety of birds, including large species such as
great blue heron
The great blue heron (''Ardea herodias'') is a large wading bird in the heron family Ardeidae, common near the shores of open water and in wetlands over most of North America and Central America, as well as the Caribbean and the Galápagos ...
s,
osprey
The osprey (''Pandion haliaetus''), , also called sea hawk, river hawk, and fish hawk, is a diurnal, fish-eating bird of prey with a cosmopolitan range. It is a large raptor reaching more than in length and across the wings. It is brown o ...
and
bald eagle
The bald eagle (''Haliaeetus leucocephalus'') is a bird of prey found in North America. A sea eagle, it has two known subspecies and forms a species pair with the white-tailed eagle (''Haliaeetus albicilla''), which occupies the same niche as ...
s. It is within the
Pacific Flyway
The Pacific Flyway is a major north-south flyway for migratory birds in the Americas, extending from Alaska to Patagonia. Every year, migratory birds travel some or all of this distance both in spring and in fall, following food sources, heading ...
. Large
mammal
Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur or ...
s on its banks include
raccoon
The raccoon ( or , ''Procyon lotor''), sometimes called the common raccoon to distinguish it from other species, is a mammal native to North America. It is the largest of the procyonid family, having a body length of , and a body weight of ...
s, a few
black-tailed deer
Two forms of black-tailed deer or blacktail deer that occupy coastal woodlands in the Pacific Northwest of North America are subspecies of the mule deer (''Odocoileus hemionus''). They have sometimes been treated as a species, but virtually all r ...
and an occasional
coyote
The coyote (''Canis latrans'') is a species of canis, canine native to North America. It is smaller than its close relative, the wolf, and slightly smaller than the closely related eastern wolf and red wolf. It fills much of the same ecologica ...
.
History
Vancouver Lake was referenced in Lewis and Clark's journal entries from November 4th, 1805
v. 6, 17.
Shortly after the lake was deeded to the Port of Vancouver, Washington, in 1919, agricultural interests proposed
draining it, (A smaller lake to the north, Shillapoo Lake, was drained and used for agriculture) but by the end of the 1920s, recreational uses were also considered. Because of cold weather, the lake was frozen solid to "several inches" in depth on February 10, 1929, and was home to 500 ice skaters one weekend.
The lake was briefly considered as a
decommissioning harbor in 1945, but after the
Memorial Day flood of 1948 was also seen as a possible resource in
flood control
Flood control methods are used to reduce or prevent the detrimental effects of flood waters."Flood Control", MSN Encarta, 2008 (see below: Further reading). Flood relief methods are used to reduce the effects of flood waters or high water level ...
.
Suburbanization
Suburbanization is a population shift from central urban areas into suburbs, resulting in the formation of (sub)urban sprawl. As a consequence of the movement of households and businesses out of the city centers, low-density, peripheral urba ...
of its
watershed
Watershed is a hydrological term, which has been adopted in other fields in a more or less figurative sense. It may refer to:
Hydrology
* Drainage divide, the line that separates neighbouring drainage basins
* Drainage basin, called a "watershe ...
area led to an increase in
water pollution
Water pollution (or aquatic pollution) is the contamination of water bodies, usually as a result of human activities, so that it negatively affects its uses. Water bodies include lakes, rivers, oceans, aquifers, reservoirs and groundwater. Water ...
.
Surface runoff
Surface runoff (also known as overland flow) is the flow of water occurring on the ground surface when excess rainwater, stormwater, meltwater, or other sources, can no longer sufficiently rapidly infiltrate in the soil. This can occur when th ...
brought increased
sediment
Sediment is a naturally occurring material that is broken down by processes of weathering and erosion, and is subsequently transported by the action of wind, water, or ice or by the force of gravity acting on the particles. For example, sand an ...
while
residential drain fields and increased use of
fertilizer
A fertilizer (American English) or fertiliser (British English; see spelling differences) is any material of natural or synthetic origin that is applied to soil or to plant tissues to supply plant nutrients. Fertilizers may be distinct from ...
s rich in
nitrogen
Nitrogen is the chemical element with the symbol N and atomic number 7. Nitrogen is a nonmetal and the lightest member of group 15 of the periodic table, often called the pnictogens. It is a common element in the universe, estimated at se ...
and
phosphorus
Phosphorus is a chemical element with the symbol P and atomic number 15. Elemental phosphorus exists in two major forms, white phosphorus and red phosphorus, but because it is highly reactive, phosphorus is never found as a free element on Ear ...
contributed to
eutrophication
Eutrophication is the process by which an entire body of water, or parts of it, becomes progressively enriched with minerals and nutrients, particularly nitrogen and phosphorus. It has also been defined as "nutrient-induced increase in phytopla ...
.
DDT
Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane, commonly known as DDT, is a colorless, tasteless, and almost odorless crystalline chemical compound, an organochloride. Originally developed as an insecticide, it became infamous for its environmental impacts. ...
was also used for
mosquito control
Mosquito control manages the population of mosquitoes to reduce their damage to human health, economies, and enjoyment. Mosquito control is a vital public-health practice throughout the world and especially in the tropics because mosquitoes spr ...
until its effects on fish and birds became apparent, and the county discontinued it. A 2005 report showed higher than normal levels of various contaminants in the lake's fish.
Since then, there have been various interests in the area as it relates to
habitat preservation, recreation and industry, culminating in the "Habitek" plan of the mid-1980s and the multi-agency Burnt Bridge Creek Watershed Plan of 1995.
Algal bloom
An algal bloom or algae bloom is a rapid increase or accumulation in the population of algae in freshwater or marine water systems. It is often recognized by the discoloration in the water from the algae's pigments. The term ''algae'' encompas ...
has been an intermittent problem for recreational use of the lake (officially recognized by the county in 2003) since
cyanobacteria
Cyanobacteria (), also known as Cyanophyta, are a phylum of gram-negative bacteria that obtain energy via photosynthesis. The name ''cyanobacteria'' refers to their color (), which similarly forms the basis of cyanobacteria's common name, blu ...
such as ''
Anabaena
''Anabaena'' is a genus of filamentous cyanobacteria that exist as plankton. They are known for nitrogen-fixing abilities, and they form symbiotic relationships with certain plants, such as the mosquito fern. They are one of four genera of cyanob ...
'', ''Microcystis aeruginosa'' and ''Cylindrospermopsin raciborskii'' may produce
neurotoxin
Neurotoxins are toxins that are destructive to nerve tissue (causing neurotoxicity). Neurotoxins are an extensive class of exogenous chemical neurological insultsSpencer 2000 that can adversely affect function in both developing and mature ner ...
s such as
cylindrospermopsin
Cylindrospermopsin (abbreviated to CYN, or CYL) is a cyanotoxin produced by a variety of freshwater cyanobacteria. CYN is a polycyclic uracil derivative containing guanidino and sulfate groups. It is also zwitterionic, making it highly water ...
.
The Vancouver Lake Watershed Partnership was formed in October 2004, bringing various public agencies with interest and jurisdiction together.
Vancouver Lake plays host to two water sport oriented recreation clubs. Vancouver Lake Crew is a high school and master aged
rowing
Rowing is the act of propelling a human-powered watercraft using the sweeping motions of oars to displace water and generate reactional propulsion. Rowing is functionally similar to paddling, but rowing requires oars to be mechanically atta ...
club that uses the lake as its primary practice facility. Along with rowing, kayaking, canoeing, and dragon boating are also popular activities hosted by Vancouver Lake Crew. On the opposite shore sits th
Vancouver Lake Sailing Clubwhere sail boats can be launched.
In 2017, lake users noticed an increasing level of Eurasian Water Milfoil (EWM) in the lake. In late 2018, concerned citizens joined forces with local and state agencies to assess the EWM infestation. In early 2019, local volunteers formed a 501c(3) non-profit
Friends of Vancouver Lake Working with the Vancouver Lake Crew, Vancouver Lake Sailing Club, and hundreds of concerned community members, they secured a Washington State permit to treat the lake with a newly-approved herbicide, ProcellaCOR. This fast-acting herbicide is targeted to EWM, but non-toxic to humans, fish, and wildlife. While environmental conditions prevented a treatment in 2019, Vancouver Lake and its flushing channel were treated with ProcellaCOR July 7th, 2020. Post-treatment surveys several weeks later showed no trace of EWM in the lake or flushing channel.
See also
*
List of lakes in Washington List of lakes of Washington may refer to:
* List of lakes of Washington (state)
* List of lakes of the Washington, D.C., area
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