Lake Assessment Program - Lake Wakanda and Kandiyohi Ditch23a , Kandiyohi County

A collaborative monitoring effort was conducted on Lake Wakanda and its primary tributary – Ditch 23a - during the summer of 2005 (Figure 1). Tributary monitoring was conducted by the Lake Wakanda Watershed Group that includes several concerned property owners in the watershed. Those prominent in developing the program and conducting the sampling included: Marilee Druskin, Allan and Linda Bjornberg, and Bruce Vruwink. Skip Wright, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) hydrologist, assisted with study design, including sample site location, frequency and parameter selection. Lake samples were also collected by the volunteers in conjunction with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency's (MPCA) CLMP+ monitoring effort, which focused on several lakes in Kandiyohi County, as well as other counties in 2005. The other Kandiyohi lakes included: Big Kandiyohi (downstream of Wakanda), Diamond and Long Lakes. A detailed report on the four lakes was prepared by Klang and Anderson (2005) and is available on the MPCA web site at: http://www.pca.state.mn.us/water/lakereport.html. Likewise, a 1985 Lake Assessment Program report for Big Kandiyohi Lake may be found at that site, as well. The current report will focus almost solely on the tributary monitoring that was done by the Watershed Group and is intended to complement the CLMP+ report. Some in-lake data for Wakanda and Big Kandiyohi Lakes for 2005 will be included here to provide further perspective on the tributary inflow and its influence on in-lake water quality. This assessment was conducted by Steven Heiskary, Research Scientist III, MPCA at the request of the Lake Wakanda Watershed Group.