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Hellyer's Cottonwood Lake: Low Water and Birds, 10/22/22 by Ronald Horii
On 10/22/22, I rode my bike to Hellyer County Park. Cottonwood Lake was getting very low. It's been gradually drying up since the end of the rainy season this year. There was a BioBlitz at Hellyer on 2/6/22. At that time, the lake was full: https://tinyurl.com/4p2hpwv8. There was another one on 5/14/22. By that time, the lake was noticeably lower: https://tinyurl.com/ks742yza. On 8/28/22, there was a summer BioBlitz there: https://tinyurl.com/2kvwrwh4. The lake had dropped even more. I was at Hellyer last month on 9/5/22. The low water and stagnant were causing toxic algae growth, which was killing carp in the lake: https://tinyurl.com/3f6jtk9f. The next BioBlitz will be on 11/19/22: https://www.bioblitz.club/. Hopefully, there will be still be water in the lake. There will definitely be more shoreline. The lower water may reveal more invertebrates, like clams. One thing I noticed was that the lower water seems to have attracted more shorebirds. They tend to like shallow water mudflats, like around the Bay. Here are pictures of the lake and the birds I saw.
Here's more information about Hellyer County Park: https://parks.sccgov.org/santa-clara-county-parks/hellyer-county-park. Here are more of my pictures of Hellyer: http://www.rhorii.com/#Hellyer
On 10/22/22, I rode my bike to Hellyer County Park. Cottonwood Lake was getting very low. It's been gradually drying up since the end of the rainy season this year. There was a BioBlitz at Hellyer on 2/6/22. At that time, the lake was full: https://tinyurl.com/4p2hpwv8. There was another one on 5/14/22. By that time, the lake was noticeably lower: https://tinyurl.com/ks742yza. On 8/28/22, there was a summer BioBlitz there: https://tinyurl.com/2kvwrwh4. The lake had dropped even more. I was at Hellyer last month on 9/5/22. The low water and stagnant were causing toxic algae growth, which was killing carp in the lake: https://tinyurl.com/3f6jtk9f. The next BioBlitz will be on 11/19/22: https://www.bioblitz.club/. Hopefully, there will be still be water in the lake. There will definitely be more shoreline. The lower water may reveal more invertebrates, like clams. One thing I noticed was that the lower water seems to have attracted more shorebirds. They tend to like shallow water mudflats, like around the Bay. Here are pictures of the lake and the birds I saw.
Here's more information about Hellyer County Park: https://parks.sccgov.org/santa-clara-county-parks/hellyer-county-park. Here are more of my pictures of Hellyer: http://www.rhorii.com/#Hellyer
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