Como Lake Fall 2024 Updates

Capitol Region Watershed District (CRWD) has been working to improve water quality in Como Lake for more than 20 years. CRWD is committed to working towards the goals of the Como Lake Management Plan (CLMP), which was developed in collaboration with the community and our partners.

Following the best water quality ever observed in Como Lake in 2023, CRWD continued implementing initiatives identified in the CLMP in 2024 to uphold the lake. This included projects to manage common carp, invasive curly-leaf pondweed, native aquatic plants, and the lakeshore, as well as extensive lake monitoring to evaluate progress. CRWD also worked with partners to clean up leaves in the curbs and storm drains and remove trash from the lake.

Aquatic Plants

Native aquatic plants are critical to Como Lake’s water quality and ecosystem health. They provide food and shelter for wildlife such as ducks, turtles, fish, and bugs. Como Lake’s native aquatic plant community had declined over the years due to poor water quality conditions and the takeover of an invasive aquatic plant called curly-leaf pondweed. CRWD has been working to reduce curly-leaf pondweed in the lake to create space for native plants to return. In March 2024, CRWD completed an herbicide treatment to control curly-leaf pondweed, critical for preventing its spread in the lake. Learn more about Como Lake Aquatic Plant Management.

Emergent Plant Seeding

CRWD has been transplanting native aquatic plants into Como Lake since 2022 to jump-start the plant community following years of degradation from poor water quality and curly-leaf pondweed takeover. In September 2024, CRWD staff harvested seeds locally from native emergent plants around Como Lake and planted them in a plot to overwinter and hopefully sprout next spring. CRWD will monitor these plots to understand this method’s viability for promoting plant growth.

Hybrid Watermilfoil

Invasive hybrid watermilfoil was first identified in Como Lake in the summer of 2024. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) investigated the report of the invasive aquatic plant and then formally listed Como Lake as infested with hybrid watermilfoil. The DNR posted an orange invasive species alert sign by the boat launch to notify the public of the presence of hybrid milfoil in Como Lake.

Hybrid watermilfoil can grow and spread rapidly, forming a dense canopy on the water surface that can prevent light from reaching native aquatic plants below and interfere with recreational boating. CRWD intends to develop a plan to keep hybrid watermilfoil in Como Lake under control alongside curly-leaf pondweed.

Common Carp Management

Common carp are invasive fish that contribute to poor water quality by stirring up the bottom of the lake while searching for food. During feeding, they uproot plants, muddy the waters for native fish, and allow excess nutrients stored in the lake bottom to be released and later consumed by algae. Common carp are among the most damaging aquatic invasive species due to their wide distribution and severe impacts in shallow lakes and wetlands.

In 2021, CRWD surveyed common carp in Como Lake and estimated their population to be above the critical threshold for water quality. CRWD has been working to reduce common carp populations in Como Lake through netting and electrofishing since 2022. You can read about the 2022 Common Carp Removal on our website.

To better assess Como Lake’s carp population, CRWD began a carp aging project in 2023 and continued efforts in 2024. Contractors used electrofishing to harvest carp from Como Lake. Researchers will remove the carp’s otoliths to estimate the fish’s age. Otoliths are part of the fish’s inner ear and grow throughout their life by accumulating material on the outer surface around a core. The material creates a visible ring that represents a year of growth. Researchers can estimate a fish’s age by counting the rings, similar to rings in a tree trunk.

From July to September 2024, the contractor removed 48 common carp from Como Lake for aging. Over the coming months, the carp’s otoliths will be removed and read to estimate the age of Como Lake’s carp population. Understanding the age of the population will help CRWD refine our strategy for carp control.

Lakeshore Vegetation Surveys

CRWD developed the Como Lakeshore Management Plan in 2022, which will guide the maintenance and management of the areas in and around Como Lake’s shoreline over the next 20 years. The plan helps CRWD and the City of Saint Paul Parks and Recreation prioritize routine shoreline maintenance and plan for larger-scale or site-specific shoreline improvement projects.

As part of CRWD’s Como Lakeshore Management Plan, staff completed a vegetation survey around Como Lake in July 2024 to inventory the diversity of plant species and identify areas needing maintenance.

Outfall Repair Project

The City of Saint Paul is working with a contractor to make sewer repairs around Como Lake in 2024 and 2025. The work focuses on the storm sewers around and entering Como Lake and includes:

  • Cleaning and televising storm sewer outlets.
  • Lining storm sewer pipes.
  • Repairing and replacing storm sewers and outfalls to the lake.

Once complete, this project will have many long-term benefits to the lake by reducing erosion in the lakeshore areas and capturing pollutants in stormwater before flowing into the lake in a large chamber underneath the south fishing pier parking lot.

Please follow updates from the City of Saint Paul Como Lake Storm Sewer Repairs for information about the project.

New Signage at Como Lake is Coming Soon

Como Lake needs new interpretive signs! The current signs at the lake were installed over 20 years ago and are outdated and weathered, making them difficult to read.

Using Environmental Protection Agency 319 grant funding, CRWD has been working with City of Saint Paul Parks and Recreation to develop new interpretive signs and a kiosk about Como Lake’s water quality. The signs include a 2-paneled kiosk and six individual signs covering the following topics:

  1. The Watershed’s Influence on Como Lake (Kiosk Panel 1)
  2. What’s Happening Inside Como Lake? (Kiosk Panel 2)
  3. Benefits of Natural Shorelines
  4. Fishing at Como Lake
  5. Como Lake’s Dynamic Food Web
  6. A Wildlife Oasis in the City
  7. Rain Gardens Help Keep Como Lake Clean
  8. The Formation of Como Lake
  9. Háza íŋyaŋke Wíŋ: A Fierce Protector of the Land and Water
  10. Omníciye Makóche: The Land Where We Gather

The sign topics were chosen based on feedback from the public received during the CLMP planning process. Installation of the signs at key locations around the lake is anticipated for spring 2025.

Protecting Como Lake

The Como Community Council (District 10) organizes cleanup events and fall curb cleanups with the support of CRWD.

Como Curb CleanUp

Como residents can help protect Como Lake by joining the Como Curb Cleanups. The neighborhood fall tradition, which is organized by the Como Community Council and Como Active Citizen Network with support from CRWD, has been going on for over a decade.

During the annual cleanup from October 1 through November 30, neighbors commit to clearing the curb in front of their home and alley of leaves weekly during the fall to help protect water quality at Como Lake. The combined efforts of neighbors helps prevent pollution in the lake. When it rains, leaves on streets release nutrients like phosphorus into the water that flows into storm drains and the lake. Once in the lake, the abundance of nutrients can fuel algae blooms and curly-leaf pondweed growth.

In 2023, combined efforts from the Como Curb Cleanups removed 11.58 pounds of phosphorus, the equivalent of 2.89 tons of curly leaf pondweed, before it reached the lake.

Como Lake Trash Cleanup

The Como Community Council, in partnership with CRWD, plans multiple Como Lake cleanup events each year. Volunteers from the community gather to clean trash from the lake surface or shoreline.

During the four cleanup events in 2024, 149 people volunteered a combined 318 hours and picked up 275 pounds of trash in and around Como Lake! Thank you to all of the volunteers who helped protect Como Lake!

Aerial view of the west side of Como Lake with the Como Lakeside Pavillion, a white building with a red roof. The calm lake reflects the sky with scattered clouds at sunset. The distant downtown Minneapolis skyline is on the horizon.
Como Pavilion at sunset. Photo by Ackerman + Gruber.
A person standing in a lake near the shoreline, surrounded by tall green reeds with a green canoe nearby. They are wearing waders and a red life vest.
CRWD staff harvested seeds from native plants around Como Lake.
A large pile of small brown seeds spread out on a paper towel on a metal workspace. A long green reed is lying in front of the pile and a handwritten square sticky note next to it reads
Sweet flag seeds collected from Como Lake.
A canoe paddle extends into a lake with submerged aquatic plants crowding the lake surface.
Invasive hybrid watermilfoil in Como Lake.
Three sprigs of frilly, green aquatic plants with featherlike leaves radiating from a thin, light brown stem. The sprigs are laying on a white plastic tray.
Native, northern and invasive Eurasian watermilfoils hybridize to form hybrid watermilfoil.
A person wearing waders holds a common carp, a large brown fish with bulging eyes and a round mouth. The person is standing in a boat on Como Lake under a clear blue sky.
Common carp are invasive fish that contribute to poor water quality in Como Lake.
An excavator and construction equipment above a storm sewer outfall, a concrete pipe in the lakeshore, at Como Lake. A yellow containment boom in front of the outfall floats in the lake.
The City of Saint Paul is working with a contractor to make sewer repairs around Como Lake, including repairing and replacing outfalls to the lake.
A faded, weathered informational sign titled
The signs that are currently at Como Lake were installed over 20 years ago and are weathered and outdated.
People using rakes and brooms to clear autumn leaves along a street curb.
Como residents help protect Como Lake by joining the Como Curb Cleanups, a neighborhood fall tradition for over a decade.
Seven smiling people in matching green shirts standing with trash grabbers and five gallon buckets near a sign that reads
Volunteers with Como Lake Cleanups collected 275 pounds of trash in and around the lake in 2024.

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