Tag Archives: ECHO

ECHO Lake Aquarium and Science Center/Leahy Center for Lake Champlain

Shrinking the Phosphorus Cycle: Lake Champlain, Phosphorus, and Time (and Patience)

This interesting article from

Anytime I hear about, read about, overhear, or talk about algae blooms in Lake Champlain an image like this one surfaces in my brain:

Shrinking the Phosphorus Cycle
from: St. Francis University (http://www.stfrancis.edu/content/ns/bromer/ecology/student1/Ecology%20Web%20Page.htm#top)

This graphic representation of the phosphorus cycle, is at the heart of water quality concerns in our Basin and a huge number of basins around the world.  If you follow the arrows which show where the essential nutrient phosphorus flows on the earth to support life as we know it.  Nearly every arrow leads to a living thing, with a few having one step in-between (like the link between the fish and the bacteria and fungi decomposers).  You can follow the arrows of flowing phosphorus for quite a while before reaching a dead end, where phosphorus no longer “feeds” some living things but actually leaves the cycle.  Where does this happen?  At the lake bottom:

Phosphorus only leaves the cycle when either dead organisms get buried in the lake bottom deep enough that decomposers (which actually lie on the lake bottom) do not break them down, or as precipitated phosphorus that settles to the bottom.
Who cares?  Why does this matter?
Getting rid of phosphorus doesn’t happen quickly and because it feeds the growth of organisms that we don’t care for, we struggle about what to do.  In other words, our desire to “clean-up the lake” depends upon changing how much phosphorus flows in the cycle.

I recently attended an informative presentation of the Lake Champlain Basin Program’s State of the Lake and Ecosystem Indicators Report by Bill Howland, the Program Manager for our partner organization.  At the outset, Mr. Howland set the stage for his talk by clarifying that the report is about the status of the lake as shown by the data chosen as indicators since the last report in 2008.  As such, he did not cover what management responses are being implemented in the Basin.  Much of the data he presented centered around phosphorus in the Lake and the Basin’s waters that feed it.  The reports section on phosphorus addresses three questions: How are phosphorous levels in Lake Champlain?  Where does the phosphorus come from?  What is being done to reduce phosphorus concentrations?  Given the media, political, environmental, and regulatory attention that phosphorus gets in our Basin, it makes a lot of sense to pay attention to phosphorus.  Despite the wealth of data about phosphorus entering the lake, its role in producing nuisance algae blooms, and the human desire to reduce the amount of phosphorus in our waterways, I rarely see the questions– “Where does phosphorus go?” and “How long will it take to get there?” — being addressed anywhere.  The answers are important, because without knowing when and how phosphorus may decline in Lake Champlain we cannot know when to see the effects of our collective efforts to “clean up the lake.”

Muskellunge Are Back!!!!!!

Lake Champlain is the only lake in New England to which muskellunge (muskie)are native.
According to the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department, the largest Muskellunge caught and recorded in Vermont was a 38.22 lbs fish taken on September 9, 2005 from the Missisquoi River by Chris Beebe.
Vermont Fish & Wildlife – Fish Transport Vehicle

 

This year ECHO Lake Aquarium & Science Center partnered with Vermont Fish & Wildlife to acquire several juvenile muskie to display in an exhibit in the near future. 
The muskie originated from eggs taken from wild brood stock collected in April, 2012 on Lake Chautauqua in western New York State. 
New York Department of Environmental Conservation’s Chautauqua Hatchery, located  on Lake Chautauqua in Mayville NY, hatched the eggs and grew them to 4 inches for release.  
Currently, the few juveniles at ECHO are 6 ½ months old, but many thousands more were released into Lake Champlain on August 22, 2012.
Juvenile Muskie Ready for Release

 

The released muskie are expected to attain 10 to 12 inches before winter sets in and their growth slows. 

In the hatchery, they have been fed exclusively a formulated pellet diet, but once they switch over to live prey in the lake, their growth rates will be very high. 

In the last 4 years, Vermont Fish & Wildlife have stocked a total of 25,000 of these fish into the lower Missisquoi River and Missisquoi Bay in an attempt to restore a viable muskellunge population to Lake Champlain.   

Here are the actual stocking numbers provided by the Vermont Fish & Wildlife:
Year             #of fish      
2008            250
2009           10,000
2010           0
2011           5,300
2012           8,800
We invite you to come visit the Upper Animal Care (UAC) window on the top floor at ECHO where we have 2 juvenile muskie on display. Come watch them grow!

Are there fish in your beer?

As a craft beer lover and avid home brewer I was thrilled when Linda Bowden, ECHO’s Life-Long Learning coordinator, announced that she was planning the beer-themed event called “FeBREWary: The Science of Beer.” As an aquatic biologist, I’m always seeking ways to link our local aquatic fauna to things that people really identify with and care about… like beer!

As it turns out, there is a quite a long history of using fish parts to clarify beer and other fermented beverages. Many fish would sink without some extra buoyancy provided by a structure called an air bladder. An air bladder is essentially a bag made of collagen into which fish can add or remove gas as they move up or down in depth. This allows fish to maintain neutral buoyancy- not sinking or floating, but hovering in one place. As with many anatomical features, air bladders can provide additional functions beyond buoyancy control.

For example, drum use the air bladder to produce and amplify a thumping sound (like a bass drum) during spawning season. Other fish, like long-nose gar and bowfin, can thrive in warmer waters that have low amounts of dissolved oxygen by gulping air and passing oxygen from surface air into their blood stream via their air bladders.

The air bladder is an essential structure for many fish, but it’s the collagen from which it’s made that matters to beer lovers. Consumers of the vast majority of beer styles look for clarity in the glass along with satisfying flavor. Most modern breweries use some form of clarification to achieve the bright clear appearance that consumers expect. Among several options for achieving clarity is isinglass, which is made from- you guessed it- fish air bladders. By extracting and processing fish air bladders, the collagen building blocks are dissolved into an acidic solution to make isinglass. When the isinglass is added to beer, millions of tiny charged collagen particles bind to oppositely charged particles of suspended yeast cells and other dissolved by-products of fermentation (hop oils, protein, etc.) that can make beer cloudy. Once added, the binding action of isinglass forms larger, more dense particles that sink to the bottom of the container and the beer “drops clear.” In as little as two days, a batch of beer will go from hazy (photo on left) to clear (photo on right) and be ready to carbonate and drink.

How the use of fish parts in the brewing process got started is not well known. One of the most likely scenarios that I’ve come across is one in which ancient people used air bladders to carry liquids, including beer. Acidic beverages, like beer and wine, likely dissolved some collagen and created favorable conditions for clarification to occur. Perhaps some ancient ale drinker set down his or her bladder of beer for a day or two, only to discover a clearer drink later on.

Want to find out more about intersection of science and the enjoyment of good beer? Join us at ECHO on the evening of February 9th. Prost!