Bell County, Texas — Editor’s note: Video provided by Earl Nottingham
It’s raining here and there, but the weather isn’t great at Belton Lake.
The lake’s water level is currently approximately 19 feet below where it should be.
Low lake levels can negatively impact local wildlife and their habitat.
“The main impact is generally a decline in stocks,” said Michael Baird, an inland fisheries biologist with Texas Parks and Wildlife.
Baird added that spawning grounds and preferred habitat for fish could be reduced.
This can push them into new habitats and new waterways.
Another potentially harmful effect of lower water levels is the accumulation of chemicals introduced into the water from humans.
Melinda Coogan, an environmentalist at Baylor University, said this drop in water levels in lake systems can cause nutrients and chemicals to condense and cause problems.
“Many of these chemicals, at certain concentrations, not only affect the viability of the organism, but also the physiology of the organism,” Coogan added.
Believe it or not, low lake levels aren’t such a bad thing.
Fish may be forced into new habitats where they would not normally exist, but they may also find new water sources that are otherwise inaccessible.
“The waterways that were probably very deep may now actually be available to fish, so maybe it’s not all bad news,” Baird said.
In terms of benefits for the community, it’s not all bad news.
Drought and low water levels have allowed people to clean up trash left in the lake for how long.
On September 16, Belton Lake trash collectors and other area residents worked to clean up the lake.
Together they collected 32,000 pounds of trash from the lake.
“We collected this much trash in three hours,” said Teresa Swanson of Lake Belton Garbage Getters.
She added that if the water levels weren’t so low, there might not have been a chance to collect as much trash.
Their desire is to keep their environment beautiful and they plan to do more cleaning in the near future.
It’s unclear at this time how much rain it will take to bring the lake’s water levels back to normal.
The amount of rain that recently fell in central Texas wasn’t enough. Only with a certain amount of rain can the water level be brought back to the required level.
“We didn’t have enough water in the reservoirs here north that feed water into Belton Lake,” said Artie Johnson with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
In order for Belton Lake to return to normal water levels, the water station must collect enough water.