Piles of mosquito water fern removed from Waverly Lake are stored at Timber-Linn Park to dry on Wednesday, Aug. 5, 2026.
Why did I hike to the back end of Albany’s Timber Linn Park on Wednesday? To confirm what a commenter told me, and yes, it once again involved the aquatic plants removed from Waverly Lake.
After the accumulation of azolla, or mosquito water fern, had been mostly removed last week, I understood that the material was taken to the city’s composting site at the sewage treatment plant. And my story said so.
A commenter, unfortunately anonymous, begged to differ. “It’s piled up in the field, east of the dog park at Timber-Linn, along the trees. This is where it has been piled each year,” he wrote.
So I went to the park and looked. Sure enough:
By email, I checked in with Tommy Reeder, the city’s parks and open space manager.
He explained: “The harvested material was hauled by the contractor to Timber Linn Park, so that it could dry out. We would have liked to have it hauled directly to the treatment plant but adding wet materials inhibits the composting process. Once dry, it will be mixed with the compost.”
Thanks for the explanation, and thanks to the commenter for straightening me out. (hh)
Here’s what the stuff removed from Waverly Lake looks like up close.
Why do they use the term “harvest”? To make it seem that removing undesirable growth has some higher, moral purpose to us taxpayers?
Maybe the City can “harvest” weeds from their overgrown lots.
I run a small business on the side selling used books. I call it The Book Harvest. “Harvest” doesn’t have to refer to just taking crops from the land. The American Heritage Dictionary also says harvest can mean “the result or consequence of an action: Our trip to the Grand Canyon yielded a rich harvest of memories”; or “to receive (the benefits or consequences of an action): harvest the rewards of hard work. See synonym: reap.”
Goid god…..thats petty! It was just an adjective. It had no nefarious intent. The stuff was harvested…..collected and transported. Sheesh!
Well, “collected and transported” describes what happened, so why didn’t they say collected?
Compost makes perfect sense. Glad to hear that. Do something good with the weed, which is worse because of all the lawn fertilizers that leach into the pond from lakes and creeks to the east.
So, instead of simply letting the algae run its normal course, the taxpayers of Albany first have to pay for the “harvest’, which is then “stored” at one location before it is moved to the final solution for composting. The algae gets handled (pick-up, put down and picked up and unloaded once again) for what purpose? So Albanians can feel pleased to support an illusion generated by the Chamber of Commerce – a myth of a beautified Waverly Lake greeting all who dare enter. Meanwhile, Albany roadways are rotting and Albany school kids have some of the lowest reading scores in the nation. Something is out of whack.
It’s like you didn’t even read it before commenting.
Thanks for caring about the community..The plants pictured are a submerged aquatic plant, called elodea..It looks like a mix of both native and the invasive Brazilian elodea.The reddish Azolla waterfern that most people saw smothering the surface might have been skimmed earlier. Their rapid and chronic growth in Waverly Lake is a symptom of high nutrients in the lake water and muck accumulated (sediment and decayed organic material) on the bottom.
If Samuel Chan is right, and an online check sure makes it look that he is, then the city’s control mechanism may backfire. A PennState Extension page on elodea or “common waterweed” says: “Harvesting through cutting or raking is usually not recommended because elodea can reproduce rapidly from fragments.”