What about FLAB?

STEP sewer supporters claim the “floating goo” in Higgins Lake is proof the lake is dying. It’s been around since the 1980s.

It is a northern Michigan lake phenomenon called FLAB – Floating Algal Benthos – for those interested in what FLAB means, prevalent in spring to mid-summer. FLAB is explained in the following article by Tip of the Mitt Watershed Council.

But first, let me explain how I ended up finding this information:

Starting in early 2022, I was demanding Lyon Township pay for testing needed to identify what the floating goo was – because GLUA would not! We all see it in our lake water, lets I.D. it first, and then determine if it benefits from septage, fertilizer, natural, or all the above nutrients.

After several months of the Lyon Twp. board stalling, I decided to get some goo samples myself AND do water testing for nitrates, nitrites, and phosphorus. The test strips I bought were reasonably accurate at parts per billion for all three substances. That is a step up from average test strips used for water or soil contamination.

I thought the goo collected just under the ice all winter long but when the ice broke up, I was amazed to discover that the goo was growing from the bottom of the lake, not collecting under the ice itself. Opaque, stringy, scattered about in 1 to 5 feet of water. I gathered samples for identification.

I later contacted the DNR to identify the substance. It is in a family of about 1000 different kinds of similar algae. Native, invasive, nobody seems to know. It likes to grow under thin ice, more prevalent now in more northern MI lakes with the shorter, less severe winters. It will feed on any nutrients it can find.

After ice out, it quickly gets uprooted by wave and wind action, dies, floats, turns brown, and collects on whatever shore the wind is blowing towards. It then turns different shades of brown (depending on near-shore debris), forms mats, then into globs, and eventually can turn like a green soup from pine pollen depending on location. 

That information did not answer all my questions, but it did prove that it was NOT the dangerous cyanobacteria occasionally blooming in shallower lakes in warmer climates. Dr. Luttonton and other alarmists have been alleging cyanobacteria in Higgins Lake for three years. 

FLAB is not the same thing, nor the same concern, NOT AT ALL! FLAB is an ugly harmless food chain event.

By early summer, FLAB is getting pounded apart by wave action near shore. By mid-summer, it is mostly in small globs. By summer’s end most of the globs have pounded out and dissipated into a film on the bottom. By October it is back into the food chain feeding the things that the minnows and crustations feed on that in turn feed the bigger fish.

These algae called FLAB care not what nutrient source they feed on while growing and basking under thin ice in late winter. A sewer system, of any kind, will not eliminate FLAB. There is no proof it would even slow it down without reduced boat traffic and serious road end wash and fertilizer use restrictions.

Do you want to first spend 115 million to find out fertilizer, oil, gas, and natural sources are just as impactful as alleged septic failures? No thanks, a fertilizer restriction seems a better first step.

As far as the water test strips, I tested many locations because Lyon Township refused to exercise due diligence on this matter. I tested repeatedly, for three weeks. I tracked time, wind direction, temperature, location, and previous weather events because they all impact near-shore water quality testing.

All that scientific protocol proved to be unnecessary as the days progressed. I was never able to register a Nitrate, Nitrite, or Phosphorous reading that was more than negligible. I even tested the goo itself to see if nitrogen building blocks were present. Nothing! Remember, this is parts-per-billion testing folks!

That testing data matches the Clean Lakes Monitoring Plan data showing the water quality is excellent and has been for all the consecutive testing done for over 20 years.

The bottom line, negligible readings, WELL BELOW any EPA level of concern, are the hype GLUA uses, and lies about, as being dangerous!!

Similar low readings in drilled water wells are also not dangerous! If lower than EPA concern readings freak you out, you need a $400.00 water filter, not a 115 million sewer. The sewer will not eliminate the low readings!!

If nitrate levels of 10.0 parts per million, and nitrites at 1.0 ppm, are the EPA concern levels, then negligible readings in parts per billion are NOT a reason to build a 115-million-dollar sewer!

We are victims of GLUA’s “how bad it is” bell ringing. FLAB visuals and “of no consequence” water quality readings are being presented as an environmental crisis!! 

The Tip of the Mitt Watershed Council interim report last summer confirmed the shoddy claims and inconsistent science used to ring that bell!

CLMP is the gold standard for testing and results. EVERYTHING else is a snapshot in time and not reliable for a water quality trend.

CLMP studies and the Tip of the Mitt Higgins Lake preliminary report are available on the Higgins Lake Land Conservancy website.

The Tip of the Mitt report is also a “button” on this website home page and or can be found HERE.

Why didn’t GLUA tell us about FLAB?? Because the truth does not support the need for a lake-wide sewer.

Read on, this is the reality…