Several thefts have been reported to the Aitkin County Sheriff's Office over the last few days from an area on the southeast side of Cedar Lake. It is believed that the suspect(s) were in a boat and traveled along the shoreline stealing from boats and docks.

Among the items taken were: a 7 1/2 hp. Evinrude motor, MinnKota trolling motor (with round transducer clipped to bottom), marine gas cans, 7-foot Bucktail rod with Pflueger reel (name Russ Peterson on rod), G-Lomis Jerk Bait rod with Abu-Garcia 6500C reel, Abu-Garcia 6500C three-speed reel, Custom made D & R Lure Secure tackle box with about 40 muskie lures.

If anyone observes any suspicious activity - please call the Aitkin County Sheriff’s Office at 927-2138 or 888-900-2138

Thanks for your help.
Scott Turner
Sheriff of Aitkin County

Things have been happening over the winter. The Tanager Bay project has been moving ahead. The original project consisted of a 127 unit planned unit development. The zoning department from Crow Wing County came out and looked the property over and cut it back to 77 units. This is a 248 acre site with two incoming streams through the property with considerable wetland. The 77 unit development will be a conservation development with all of the state guidelines for setbacks being followed.

The only structure on the lakeshore that we know of so far would be a community building with a pool and the docks. The rest of the sites would be back from the lake. Originally it was plotted out for 31 lakeshore lots. These lots were mostly wetlands along the shore and you know that these wetlands would have been changed with homes on these sites. I feel that there is less impact on the lake with 77 offshore lots than with the original 31 lots.

The county board accepted the SR2 and SR2.5 zoning. Time will tell what impact this will have on our lake. Jay Nord who is working with the developer will speak at our annual meeting on what is happening so far.

We experienced very low water levels last fall. I was in contact with Lonnie Thomas with the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) on possibly putting a gate in the outlet of the lake to maintain a higher level. He stated that we are no longer able to put in a removable gate to maintain lake levels. He said that the level would have to be changed with a non-removable structure to make this a permanent thing and that this would change setbacks and could make existing structures non-conforming. So it looks like this change is out of the picture.

We will continue to monitor the water quality of the incoming streams this year as we have in the past. We will also take secchi disk reading on the water clarity in the lake. If you are interested in taking these readings in your area of the lake contact us at the annual meeting.

We are also looking for someone to do a loon count on the lake in the fall. This count will go to the DNR and be posted on their website. We seem to have a very high population of loons on Cedar compared to other lakes. We will also look at building loon nesting platforms to put out on the lake.

Keep checking our website for updates. 

Hope everyone has a great summer.

Those of you who attended the annual meeting have had a chance to see the plan developed by the planning task force to address our top five issues as defined in our survey results. Take a look at the executive summary of the survey. Take a look at the plan. Both the Survey and the Plan have links below.  If you have questions, give me or any board member a call.

Lake level was not one of our top issues based on survey results but Mother Nature seems to have changed our priorities. Getting boats off lifts and access to Bay Park bay seem to be the two biggest problems although the shallow water does tend to keep the wake boarders out of Bay Park. The solution to our low water problem is not quite as simple as some folks would believe. In the short run, lake levels can be raised but higher lake levels are just going to lead to more shore erosion, more silt in the water and eventually the same problems we’re seeing now, just at a higher mean lake level. Obviously, we can’t just keep raising the lake every time the silting problem causes channel filling and boat lift problems. Perhaps unseen in all this is that this silt brings with it all kinds of nutrients that are speeding up the death of Cedar Lake. Lake level can be raised but it’s a short term fix. The lake level has already been raised about 4” above the DNR set point by fill-in under the railroad trestle but as we can see from the current problems, it hasn’t really helped. Right now various members of the board are exploring short term ways to address our problems such as dredging the Bay Park entrance and getting permission from the DNR to raise lake levels. But I can’t say this strongly enough. Until many more of you provide good shoreline stewardship, we will have these same problems every time we have a dry year while we cause water quality problems in wet years. Break this silt cycle. If you have the resources, re-vegetate along your shore with plants that will hold the soils and trap run off from your lawns. There is a short course this month at the Deerwood town hall to learn how to do this. If nothing else, where you don’t need access to the lake, just let the last ten feet near the lake grow up. Don’t be part of the problem.

Those of you who use County 28 have no doubt seen the Conservancy’s name up in lights-headlights that is. The Conservancy has been given the section of “28” from “210” to “117” for liter pickup. I’d like to thank the Buhlman’s and Paul Hauge for helping us get this section. We will be having our first pick-up followed by a get together in September. See the notice elsewhere in this newsletter.

Hope you’ve all enjoyed the summer on the lake as much as we have this year. Swimming has been wonderful. Hopefully we can get a good winter recharge to bring lake levels back up for next year. Have a safe rest of the summer. If you live on Cedar, remember to vote this fall for county offices. Find out where the candidates stand on lake issues and vote for candidates that understand our issues and will factor them into any decisions they make that will affect the lake.

Executive Summary of the Lake Survey, 2005

Cedar Lake Conservancy Work Plan 2006-2007