Let's talk about Lake Eucha. As most of you know, the City of Tulsa built and owns Lake Eucha. Tulsa draws about half of its raw water from Lake Eucha and the other half from Lake Oolagah. Susan Savage is the Mayor of Tulsa and she claims that Tulsa sells water to 1 of every 6 persons in Oklahoma, over 500,000 people. I find that a bit difficult to believe but she is the Mayor and she ought to know. Knowing that Tulsa is in the business of selling water puts a new light on the Lake Eucha problem. When people purchase water, they generally are not very tolerant of taste and odor problems. Even water purchased by industry must meet fairly high standards and Tulsa certainly wants to attract more industry.

Most water treatment facilities treat their raw water to remove taste and odor among other things and Tulsa can do the same. Such treatment is expensive, however, especially if you are treating water for 1/6 th of the state. Mrs. Savage prefers to lower those treatment costs by attacking to source of the problem. So what causes taste and odor problems in the raw water? Most taste and odor problems in drinking water come from algae. When the algae die, the decomposing organic matter releases chemicals that foul the water.

Fish kills sometimes result when an overabundance of algae enters the bloom stage which blocks the sunlight from entering the water and that causes the photosynthetic (green) plants in the water to produce less oxygen. The fish die from lack of oxygen and that creates bad publicity, especially for a lake that hosts many bass tournaments. Did I forget to mention that Lake Eucha is a trophy lake? More on this later.

So what causes a lake to have such an over-abundance of algae that the water becomes horrid with taste and odor problems? Well, algae thrives on fertilizer just like any other plant. Of course, fertilizer is referred to as "nutrients" now. And the basic nutrients are nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium.

I suppose everybody can guess the next question. Where do the nutrients come from? This is where most of the arguments start but the truth is nutrients come from a variety of sources including poultry litter that has been applied to pastures and hay meadows. And poultry litter is the source that has been blamed for the problem at Lake Eucha, which is really a problem only when the water reaches Tulsa's treatment plants.

Now let's get back to the bass tournament. Bass are predator fish that are very efficient at eating other fish and invertebrates, that is animals that have no backbone such as insects and crayfish that live in the water. Bass do not care that much for plant foods. But many of the invertebrates are vegetarians and their principle diet consists of -wouldn't you know it- algae.

Now let's think about this for a minute. More algae equals more invertebrates which equals more food for the bass which equals more and bigger bass which equals more bass fishermen which equals more tourism which equals more money from somewhere else. On the other hand, more bass equals fewer invertebrates, which equals - MORE algae! Seems like bass and algae just go together doesn't it? So, do you think Lake Eucha has ever been stocked with additional bass? Most of the lakes in Oklahoma are stocked yearly.

We do have some fine trophy lakes in Oklahoma that have little or no algae problem. Broken Bow Reservoir is a good example. Broken Bow Reservoir also has the clearest water (lowest turbidity) of any reservoir in the state. With all that sunlight reaching deep into the water, even small amounts of nutrients will cause extremely rapid algae growth. Another characteristic of Broken Bow Reservoir is that it provides drinking water to a large percentage of the local population via the gravity flow system. And don't forget the trout stream that depends on high quality water from the reservoir. These factors combined cause many state and federal agencies to consider Broken Bow Reservoir to be in need of "extra" protection. Now the science is there to support that position and I must say that I agree. After all, I am a purchaser of water from the gravity flow system and we all know that Broken Bow Reservoir is the centerpiece of the area' s tourism industry. Nevertheless, there is more to the story.

Lake Eucha definitely has some nutrient loading problems even though water quality remains fairly high and Broken Bow Reservoir definitely has the finest water in the State (and don't think for a minute that Susan Savage is not green with envy). Otherwise they are very similar in that they are both magnets for tourism, both are high profile lakes when it comes to public sentiment, and both provide drinking water to a large percentage of the local population. And both are very high priority with the environmental agencies.

Could the situation in the Eucha Watershed be repeated in the Broken Bow Reservoir Watershed? Well, yes it could. In today's society a body of water, any body of water, represents different things to different people. When a person or municipality or other government agency or environmental organization perceives a threat to its source of drinking water, tourism dollars, recreation opportunities, or "natural" environment then emotions are stirred. Each party tends to aggressively defend its own interest even to the point of being unfair to the other interested parties. The media often fans the flames such as what happened in the Eucha situation.

The point of all this is that poultry producers, in ANY watershed, need to give a lot of thought to the image of the poultry industry within their community. Farmer's are the original environmentalists and we know more about protecting natural resources than most of the other folks. Our livelihood depends upon our management and responsible use of those resources. Besides, farmers enjoy clean water to drink just as much as Susan Savage. Just be part of the solution instead of the problem.

By the way, Lake Tenkiller has been described as "dead" and beyond rehabilitation, Lake Wister has some problems and is drawing almost as much concern as Lake Eucha would without the publicity, and The Grand Lake of the Cherokees is also dealing with nutrient loading although most of its watershed drains from Kansas and Missouri. The situation with Lake Eucha is not unique and is actually a classic example of what is occurring all around the nation.

The bottom line is, we all live and operate upstream from someone else. Be aware of who they are and what is important to them and try not to be a threat in their eyes.