When Andrea McGuire bought her waterfront cottage on Georgian Bay seven years ago, she looked out onto a packed sand and pebble beach. But after years of dropping water levels, Ms. McGuire now has to contend with the biological refuse caused by groins that trap stagnant water in front of her property. Now, the water and pebbles are fringed with algae and swampy wetland greenery has started to encroach upon what was once a swimmer's dream beach.
"The E. coli levels are enough that on a hot day you wouldn't want to swim in there," Ms. McGuire said. "[It's]not ideal for someone who wants to have a pristine beach."
After more than five years of ebbing water levels in Lake Huron's Georgian Bay and the rest of the Great Lakes, encroaching greenery and receding waterlines are starting to plague some property owners in cottage country.
Chad Campbell, a real-estate agent in the Wasaga Beach area, said algal growth and the high bacteria concentrations caused by still water could affect a cottage's value by $50,000 to $100,000. "At that point, the place only has a view and not use of the water," he said.
According to Environment Canada's models, hotter seasons caused by climate change could mean increased evaporation and, thus, lower lake levels. If water levels continue to drop, the results for some waterfront property owners will be slimy and messy.
Judith Grant, president of the Federation of Tiny Township Shoreline Associations, said some shallow beaches are battling stinky algal puddles as the main body of the bay recedes farther from the shore.
"It makes a pleasant beach unpleasant," she said. "The problem is not universal, but it could become more widespread if the water drops further."
After a violent rainstorm this past Wednesday afternoon, Jennifer Young took her two-year-old son, Gregory, out to play on the beach in Tiny Township. This is the second year that Ms. Young and her family have rented a cabin on that beach, but this year, scraggly grasses have started to appear.
Though she said it's still a lovely place to stay, when her son picks up a pebble to plunk into the lake, "it's green and slimy around the edges."
Climate change may not be the only reason water levels are dropping. The groins on Ms. McGuire's beach were installed in the high-water heydays of the 1950s. They were put in to trap sand and aid access to the cabins by boat. But now the provincial government won't let her remove the groins for fear of an adverse effect on the habitat. After two years of trying to co-ordinate efforts with three different ministries, Ms. McGuire said she has given up.
"You almost need to say that [dealing with the ministries]is a full-time job," she said. "I left it because I didn't have time."
In June, the Georgian Bay Association funded a study by W.F. Baird & Associates Coastal Engineers on the oft-anecdotal complaints of declining water levels. The report concluded that the dredging of the St. Clair and Detroit river system and the subsequent erosion has led to a 33-centimetre drop in Lake Huron's water level since the 1960s.
"By 2050, we'll be a metre lower than we are right now," said Mary Muter, vice-president and chair of the Environment Committee for the Georgian Bay Association. "We're going down."
But not everyone is convinced that the water is falling for good.
Chuck Southam, water resources engineer at Environment Canada's Centre for Inland Waters, said it is possible that the low water levels in Georgian Bay could just be part of a cyclical phenomenon.
"We're still within the historical range of ups and downs," he said, adding that all of the Great Lakes have been experiencing low water levels over the past few years. Environment Canada's lake level data, which date back to 1918, show that water levels in Lakes Michigan and Huron actually reached their record low in 1964.
Over the past three decades, the conjoined lakes have in fact recorded extremely high water levels compared with earlier in the century -- a condition, Mr. Southam said, that cottagers too quickly forget. He fears that cottage owners who start building their property to accommodate the added beach on their waterfront could see their hard work swept away from shore in a bad storm when -- and if -- water levels rebound.
"It's gut-wrenching to see people's property in jeopardy," Mr. Southam said, recounting storms when water levels in Lake Huron hit all-time highs in the late 1980s.
He remembers frantic phone calls from cottagers who struggled to buckle up their homes as swells hit the windows. "Back then, I was wondering if levels were ever going to go back [down]" he said.
They did. But whether they'll stay down, only time, or more studies, will tell.
Until then, summering urbanites and the locals alike will just have to wait and watch the limits of the lake.
"I've lived on the water for a number of years," Ms. McGuire said. "You see [the water drop]and you notice it. Where is the water going and what are we doing about it?"