It has come to my attention that some or all of the Lake Buel District Tax bills to owners in Monterey may be doubled. The Commitment Book and software program are correct. You may contact me at pmtreas@yahoo.com to confirm your bill or just mail in 1/2 if you are in Monterey and you are sure your bill has been doubled. The New Marlborough bills appear to be correct.
Thank you,
Pat Mielke
District Collector
Paul Hatch sent a message to the Lake Buel mailing list. I’m posting it here with some minor edits to remove references to particular properties:
Hey Everyone,
Last night was a wild and wooly, full-blown January nor’easter-like night. Trees and boughs were crashing all over the place. I took a long walk around the Lake Buel Road side of the lake this morning and found only one tree on a house…. There were lots of very near misses, and some smaller trees down that got cleared up pretty quickly.
Power and phones over in the Downs Road area went out at 7:25pm Monday night and have stayed out. There was a live power line down across Downs Road, which is why the road was closed. When I came upon it mid-morning, it was surging, sparking and generating 3 to 4 inch flames in the leaves and pine needles here and there. Pretty impressive, so I trotted the rest of the way up to Lake Buel Road, flagged down a truck, and urged the driver to contact National Grid when he got into cell service and let them know they needed to get out here now. Must have worked as the reports show the road opened later in the afternoon. But I’m not sure if the power is back on in the immediate neighborhood yet. I left the lake at about 1:30 this afternoon and it was still down at that time, and Bill reported it was still out at almost 6pm.
I took a fairly comprehensive tour of the lake and found very little significant damage. I was not able to view every single cottage, but a good number of them. Gibson’s Grove was in good shape as was Laurel Banks, Abel’s Ridge and Dentist Row. The Camp Half Moon entrance was blocked off so I didn’t get down there, or North Cove. Along the way, I spoke with some contractors who were out and about making sure their clients were all ok, so if there’s a problem with your cottage, you probably know by now. …
The lake is up only a few inches. Chris Hassett told me he and Mark Amstead (and Pete Hagen?) were going to work on the outlet control over the weekend in advance of the storm, and apparently their work was helpful. Thanks, guys!
I hope this helps alleviate your concerns, and my best wishes go out to those of you who were in harm’s way elsewhere.
With warmest regards,
Paula
Thanks, Paula! We’re all glad you’re safe.
Initial reports garnered from the Lake Buel mailing list seem to indicate that the damage caused by Sandy was less than it might have been.
The power went out for a few hours in at least some spots on the Lake.
Peter Menaker Road was closed the day after, but because there was no surface erosion visible from the top of the road, it’s suspected that there is a downed tree.
So far not many trees seem to have fallen, although there are lots of branches down.
The level of the Lake seems to have gone up 4-6″.
Reports suggest even lighter damage on the 57 side of the lake.
If you have more information, please either post it as a comment to this post or let us know and we’ll update this post directly. Thanks.
Imagine heading out to grille chicken on the deck and encountering this on the railing? Repulsive yet intriguing. Those are small bones! How did it get there? What on earth put it there (or “left” it, “deposited” it?). Is this a good thing or a problem?
Turns out it’s a good thing if you want confirmation that birds of prey such as Owls reside among us along Lake Buel. You see these birds do not process everything they eat quite the same way as one might think. Undigested food items are internally formed into a ball and regurgitated. The result is what is called a pellet or cast. So evidently an Owl or Hawk ate well and decided to complete the process on our deck railing.
Our grilled chicken was good, although we were careful to avoid ingesting any bones.
There’s nothing quite like sitting by a wood stove or an open fireplace to take the chill off as the days grow shorter and the temps fall. Perhaps you also get satisfaction from knowing that burning wood is displacing use of expensive heating oil or propane. But did you also know that you could inadvertently be introducing invasive insects to Lake Buel’s shorelines? It’s true if you ‘import’ firewood.
The beautiful forests surrounding our Lake are under assault from invasive species. Common threats include woolly adelgid killing Hemlocks and the Asian Longhorned beetle and emerald ash borer insects attacking hardwood trees. Already woolly adelgid is ravaging eastern MA and metro New York, and Asian Longhorn beetles are prevalent in sections of Worcester County, MA and have been sighted in Brookline and Boston. With its initial infestation point most likely Brooklyn, the Asian Longhorned beetle has since spread throughout metro New York City including New Jersey. Even Central Park has not been immune! It has been described as the most destructive non-native insect in the US.
What can we do? Be very careful about buying firewood. Know where it is sourced, and insist on buying from reputable local firewood dealers. And be very skeptical of buying bargain firewood in areas where the Asian Longhorned beetles are prevalent. Don’t inadvertently accelerate the spread of invasive species by “importing” diseased firewood to Lake Buel. Buy local!
What to learn more? Here are a few sites you might find helpful:
New York Dept of Environmental Protection
Many part-time residents have expressed the desire to spend more time at the Lake, but can’t because they lack high-speed internet access. Telecommuting on Mondays or Fridays (or full-time!) isn’t an option for most without high-speed internet access. Fulltime residents have been equally frustrated with slow options — dial up internet or DSL for a subset of Lake residents.
You may have heard about Wired West, and the effort to build out the “last mile” network bringing true high-speed internet access along with digital telephone and television options to the Berkshires. We’re passing along information from Wired West, and ask that you take a few minutes to complete the brief Expression of Interest survey card. This is your opportunity to communicate if you are interested, and assessing potential demand is key milestone for Wired West. Without sufficient demand, it is much more difficult to justify the network build-out. Some residents may also receive a survey card in the mail, although online completion is preferred by Wired West.
“WiredWest is our communities’ chosen solution to the regional problem of inadequate broadband.
In Western Massachusetts, over 40 towns have inadequate access to high-speed internet, while it has become a necessity in today’s digital world. Even those who have broadband access are using outdated technologies that are not robust enough to equip our businesses, students and workers to survive and thrive.
Western Massachusetts towns are creating our own solution to this problem. We’ve created a municipal cooperative of member towns, and are working with state and local organizations to build a financially sustainable, state-of-the-art fiber-optic network to serve everyone. A network that will have the capacity to last for decades to come. And a network that will drive regional economic development, create jobs, improve education and healthcare, and provide a sustainable future for our communities.
You probably have a lot of questions about the details. To find out more about the WiredWest project, please see About Us, FAQ, Project Overview, and how you can help the project here.”
CELEBRATE THE CLOSING OF THE SUMMER SEASON WITH A BIG BANG!
Photo by Paul Schaittacher
This year’s fireworks will be held on Saturday, September 1 at 9pm (rain date is Sunday, September 2) on the beachfront of KSA Sports Camp on the western end of the lake.
Every year, the District sponsors a magnificent display of fireworks on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend for the benefit of all District residents, friends and neighbors. The display is put on by our very own master Harvester, Dave Lewis, who is also a licensed pyro-technician and the owner and operator of Berkshire Fireworks.
ENJOY!
Welcome to the first official post on Lake Buel’s new blog! (The one above this about zebra mussels is pinned there semi-permanently, so it doesn’t count :)
This blog is by and for the Lake Buel community. It’s a place to share information, stories, photos and more. We hope that it will also be useful to people who have not been here but who are curious about the Lake.
We encourage you to explore the various pages attached to this blog by clicking on the links below the photo of the Lake at the top. If you have questions or comments, please use the commenting feature. Comments are posted unedited, although we of course reserve the right to remove any that are less than civil or are spam; this is not the place to rent your house or sell your boat. It is a place to talk about that which will help each of us preserve the Lake and enhance our experience of it.
If you would like to become a regular blogger, please send an email to one of the initial administrators of this site: Paula Hatch, Chuck Pierce, Ginny Hyde, or David Weinberger. (Please check the blogging guidelines first.)
If you have questions about this blog, or ideas for how it can be improved — and we know there’s lots of room for improvement! — please let us know, either in the comments for this post, or via email to any of the administrators.
And a special shout out of thanks to Robert Chamberlain for so kindly and generously letting us use the LakeBuel.org domain name. Thanks, Robert!
Urgent: Protect Lake Buel! You must scrub anything you put into Lake Buel before it enters the water. More info here.
Lake Buel - A place we love 