Citizens Lake Monitoring Network (CLMN)
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources runs the Citizen Lake Monitoring Network (CLMN). The core of the Wisconsin Lakes Partnership, CLMN creates a bond between over 1,000 citizen volunteers statewide and the DNR. Its goals are to collect high quality data, to educate and empower volunteers, and to share this data and knowledge.
What can you do?
One of our goals via our Comprehensive Lake Management Plan is to increase our amount of CLMN Volunteers. Help with water quality testing by collecting samples throughout the summer. Join us, learn, and participate in this citizen science activity!Interactive charts and graphs of all of the data collected are available on the CLMN Water Explorer website.
Some Background on the Program:
WLA volunteers take water quality and chemistry samples four times each open water season. The first is taken within two weeks of ice out, and the remaining are taken during the second half of the months of June, July, and August. Volunteers measure water clarity using the Secchi Disk method. Volunteers also collect water chemistry (phosphorus, chlorophyll), as well as monitor for the first appearance of aquatic invasive species near boat landings, other access points, or along the shoreline. Per our Comprehensive Lake Management Plan, we now monitor Dissolved Oxygen (DO) and temperature. A video about CLMN testing processes is here. The water quality of Wheeler Lake is very good based on data collected over the years. The quality has remained stable when comparing a sample from 1976 to many samples collected from 1986 to 2020. The clarity is very good with Secchi readings to 31.5 feet and total phosphorus average at 10 ug/l. This classifies the lake as oligotrophic meaning it is a deep, clear lake with low nutrient levels, low productivity and a desirable fishery of large gamefish.