Drought Lowers Lake Levels
Well, this is our final Dams Keeper Report for the season. Whoever said, “Summer in Maine is nothing but two weeks of bad sledding,” wasn’t too far off the mark! It seems like summer should be getting longer with all of that global warming, but we are here regardless.
Last year at this time, Great Pond was down just 1.56″ below full pond with both gates completely closed. In 2016, Great Pond at the Village Dam was down 7.56″ on this date. Although, we are getting reports of water levels down 6-8″ up in North Bay, this is an anomaly, as the Village Dam registers just ¼″ down below full as of today. This discrepancy will require further scrutiny over the coming days and weeks. We know that North Bay is some five miles north of the Village Dam’s staff gauge, but there is more to this story.
Long Pond’s Wings Mill dam is currently down 6″ as of this writing on August 11, with upper Long Pond at 7.25″ below full. Long Pond, back in 2018 was a preposterous 12.36″ below full on this date. For comparison in 2016, Long Pond was down this date just 10.92″ below full which we thought was historic at the time. Salmon/McGrath is down 2.4″ below full with Messalonskee down 4.2″. The rain gauge at Wings Mill recorded just 1.52″ for the past ten days and we are forecasted for basically nothing at 0.09″ for the next ten.
This drought is affecting all of the waters in the State in case you were asking. As of this writing, Moosehead Lake is 1.2′ below their typical summer level. Sebago is 2′ below their summer target. So, we are not alone! (Webmaster’s Note: Moosehead and Sebago and the largest and second largest lakes in Maine, respectively. Great Pond, the largest by far of the Belgrade Lakes, is sixteenth largest in the state.)
The plan now is to try and keep what we have until the fall lake drawdown, which calls for Great and Long Ponds to be drawn down to 1.5′ — 2.0′ and Salmon down to 1.0′ — 1.5′ by November 1. Weather permitting, the drawdown usually begins after the Columbus Day weekend, but at this rate it might just be moot. We’ll probably already be down to our Fall/Winter storage levels by then.
Enjoy what’s left of the summer of 2026 and your vacation! Thank you for your patience during this drought, and stay trimmed up! See you next summer!
Dick Greenan is chairman of the Belgrade Lakes Watershed Dams Committee. He submitted this report on August 11, 2026.
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