Clean Up the Lake is back under the surface of Donner Lake implementing a monitoring program as part of their five year cleanup & litter prevention strategy.

Since their initial cleanup of Donner Lake in 2020, CUTL is expanding their cleanup program to include: a full recircumnavigation to monitor changes over two years, exploration of litter issues at deeper depths down to 100 feet, pilot research of aquatic invasive species, algal bloom issues and continued data collection to help combat the ongoing pollution issues facing Donner Lake. 

The team is now past halfway around the lake for the second time. The team has already removed more litter than the 5,151lbs previously collected during the entire 2020 circumnavigated clean up. 

With another half of the circumference of Donner Lake to go, and 3 deeper clean up dives still not performed.    

Through this refinement, the Clean Up The Lake team has found that their clean up protocol developed over the last two years has become more streamlined, allowing them to remove more moderately weighted litter items left behind such as tires, anchors, illegal buoy moorings and more; as well as having improved dive-team formations that allow them to discover a higher quantity of small litter items. 

In addition to this, the team has seen a stronger accumulation of litter along drop offs within the lake; where litter gets pushed up during wind events and storms. Lastly, they have been able to better understand where weather patterns may accumulate more trash and dedicate more time or larger teams in those locations.  

Within their five year plan, the team is excited to compare and contrast the data from this monitoring project and bring it to the public in the form of further educational programs, awareness campaigns and hopes to have further signage and the possibility of litter-art installations in the Truckee area.