Thank you Walter (Regan of the Sackville Rivers Association) for `heads up’, i.e., for keeping me in touch regularly and sending me the HRM (Dr. Tony Blouin’s) report to the Regional Council; in this particular case, I was indeed aware of it since I was peeking at the Council agenda yesterday morning but please do keep me in touch in future. For potential multiple value, I am Cc’ng to other possibly interested officials.

I shall do my best to summarize (in 11 focused points) but I will be happy to expand further if invited to make a presentation by anybody to anybody; these days, as a rule, I am available only on Wednesdays and Sundays. Underlined words are clickable relevant web links:

(1)   Firstly, HRM’s inlake chemical data is not detailed and has not taken into account many parameters which show the exact opposite in some cases, alas! HRM’s data was collected at a level that is typically carried out by volunteer groups and not by anyone considered as a `leading limnologist`!

In addition, nowhere does it explain the collection as well as the analytical methodologies (towards the end of this e-mail, I will explain more about major shortcomings in phosphorus analyses as was revealed over the last 5 long years and that applies to some of my own team’s past data as well which Tony also obviously used in his analyses to the Regional Council)!

(2)   In addition, Tony’s determination of the `trophic status’ is based on ancient methodology and not what has been discussed at numerous international scientific conferences attended by leading scientists throughout the world. True trophic status is NOT defined based on such indicators exclusively.

Wetzel’s year-2001 state-of-the-art text book clearly summarizes leading peer reviewed published papers, and I cited it exactly in our Master Homepage and excerpts are, "Trophy of a lake refers to the rate at which organic matter is supplied by or to the lake per unit time."!

The late Bob Wetzel of the USA was one of the three (3) leading limnologists in the whole world and he was indeed a Scientific Director of my group (he passed away on April 18, 2005). Bob had sent me several e-mails and even some manuscripts.

(3)   Neither phosphorus nor chlorophylla can do total justice to the definition.

In addition, the inlake chemical standards originate from deep lakes whereas almost all lakes in HRM (and all over in Nova Scotia) are shallow.

(4)   Almost all the standards inclusive of our Canadian CCME guidelines are from work spearheaded by Dr. Richard Vollenweider but they totally ignored his major cautions, alas.

(5)   The limnology of shallow lakes can be quite different as discussed at numerous international conferences.

(6)   One has to carry out a whole bunch of BIOLOGICAL ANALYSES before one can truly conclude one way or the other.

(7)   The methodology Tony Blouin followed is/was also followed by many others inclusive of my team in the past until we found that was not the proper definition of trophic status. Many have unfortunately OVERSIMPLIFIED and that is the fundamental problem.

He did cite the CCME’s guidelines properly but if one reads clearly the background report of Environment Canada (cited in the CCME document), shortcomings of depending totally on chemical data are indeed noted there.

I have already discussed these aspects with senior professionals at Environment Canada’s head office and Cc’d to the CCME (the CCME does not have any scientists on staff, they rely on other Government agencies).

(8)   In addition, as I stated at some past meetings of the HWAB (Halifax Watershed Advisory Board) as well as at several meetings of the Nova Scotia Dept. of Environment inclusive of the one held on August 17, 2006, trophic status can only be ascertained on a PROBABILISTIC LEVEL using the routine parameters!

Kindly listen to the short 4-minute mp3 sound file of Dr. Richard Vollenweider on this subject; Dr. Vollenweider is only one of the four Canadians to have ever been a recipient of the top international medal in limnology, the Naumann-Thienemann Medal! Bob Wetzel of the USA was also a recipient of that medal as well.

(9)   In addition, a lot of the historic phosphorus data (including our own) is QUESTIONABLE!

The VG labs had admitted 3 years ago that their phosphorus analyses was incorrect; until then, other local labs inclusive of the private labs (which I believe Tony was referring to in his report) had their analyses conducted at the VG labs.

I am not sure how accurate the CWRS-Dalhousie data was/is as well since they have never been peer reviewed by CAEAL and others.

The local labs (excepting CWRS) now subcontract to the NB Provincial Lab at Moncton for such analyses, but questions have arisen about their accuracy as well with respect to the phosphorus values at the lower end of the range (there is assumed to be no problem at the higher levels)!

That is one of the reasons we send some of our samples to the Federal labs and some even to the top ones in the USA although we used the aforesaid labs in Halifax in the past (and I am not too proud to strongly self-critique some of our own past data as well).

(10)                But we put lot more emphasis on detailed biological monitoring (more emphasis on zoobenthos and phytobenthos)! Most state-of-the-art limnologists also do the same (all one has to do is keep on top of the scientific literature on a regular basis).

(11)                In addition, Tony Blouin also states that the trophic status of Russell Lake (Dartmouth) was eutrophic/hypereutrophic but he based his opinion on the some archives that I had supplied him.

Those archives originate with the NSEL!

You and Dr. Wayne Stobo of HWAB are aware of the first ever paleolimnology being conducted by the Queen’s and Trent Universities. They have challenged the historical data of NSEL and went into considerable detail with me that I also shared with many at HRM and the NSEL.

Hence, one should forget the local historic chemical data for now and use it only as an intellectual discussion point.

I originally got quite upset with Prof. Dr. John Smol FRSC (as Councillor McCluskey can recall) but he does make sense and he has become one of the world’s leading paleolimnologists.

He recently was awarded the coveted Evelyn Hutchinson Medal by the ASLO and Wayne Stobo must be aware of the credibility of that medal (there is one scientist, Trevor Platt, at BIO who was also a recipient of it though in another sub-discipline)!