LAKELAND, Fla. — A huge project is underway along Lakeland’s Lake Hollingsworth.
The city is using a unique piece of equipment to remove excess and non-native plant life from the lake, hoping it adds biodiversity and also improves the water quality.
“The easiest way to describe it is a big aquatic lawnmower,” Cody O’Gorman said, who is overseeing the project.
This is the first time the city has deployed the aquatic harvester on Lake Hollingsworth.
They’ve tested it on some smaller lakes where they say it worked well.
“It allows water to flow through and it's actually like a vortex. It will pull it to the conveyor, and the conveyor is constantly moving with the movement of the boat, and it just feed rate of the conveyor and pulls it right up,” O’Gorman said.
Over the next few weeks, the harvester will remove native plants that have become overgrown and invasive species that don't belong here.
“We need to reduce certain plants in the lake so that we can get diversity of plants and animals back into our lake the way we need it to be,” Laurie Smith, city of Lakeland lakes and stormwater manager, said.
It's estimated the barge will collect about 30 to 50 tons of vegetation each day, which will then be composted and used for other environmental projects.
“I definitely think it's a good idea,” neighbor Valerie Stern said as she watched it all happen. “Might as well get it to be recycled rather than just collecting around and keep it clean. It's good maintenance.”
Lakeland city workers say the harvester is unique in this region.
Most municipalities, including Lakeland, use herbicides to kill off plant life.
But in doing so, dead plants decay and sink to the bottom. By harvesting and removing the plants, they reduce nutrients, algae and helps to improve water quality, which the city is under a state order to do.
“A lot of decay at one time can also deplete the oxygen content in the water column,” Smith said. “That can lead to fish kills and it also drives that algae fueling cycle. So, it's a great benefit to actually remove them from the lake.”
Aside from the lake just looking prettier, the project coincides with the onset of hurricane season.
Keeping drainage pipes clear is key to prevent flooding.
“By opening up these corridors, we will be able to have the stormwater flow freely into the lake during those storm events,” Smith said.
The harvester and conveyor belt cost the city about $240,000. They say it’s already paid for itself considering how much they used to pay outside contractors to do similar work.
Visitors to Lake Hollingsworth will have plenty of opportunity to catch the harvester in action. The project is expected to last at least four to six weeks.
“This is like the crown jewel of Lakeland,” O’Gorman said. “Everybody calls it ‘the’ lake. We have so many residents during the week, and on the weekends, we just use this resource so much. So, maintaining it is crucial.”