North Twin Lake Story from Dave and Katherine Linder
September 2025
My wife Katherine (KAP) and I have lived on North Twin Lakes for over 37 years. The Linder family has owned property on Twin Lakes for over 100 years. In that time water quality of the lake has vacillated. We often have green algae blooms when heavier rains feed nitrogen and warmer weather with accompanying abundant sunlight power growth. We have never kept our children or grand children from swimming in the water. My wife and I grew up on Iowa lakes and we believe lakes are a whole lot better to swim in than highly chemically treated swimming pools. Even so in our years on the lake we have witnessed a significant increase in the phenomenon of shoreline drifts of phosphorus foam in the spring and fall. The shoreline sometimes looks like it has 2 to 3 feet of snow drifts as we look across the lake at the foam formed by wave action in the early spring and fall. Phosphorous from yard fertilizer run off, detergents, and crop fertilizer run off are to blame for the foam. When I was a youngster 50 years plus ago I do not recall any foam build ups around the shoreline.
North Twin Lake has seen tremendous growth in building large year round homes in the last 40 years. Many of these homes have foundations that have been dug right to the shoreline disturbing the natural topography and integrity of the lake bank. This practice will lead to increased silting and shoreline seawall failure that ultimately pollutes the lake with soil and other debris. Zoning regulations have not been able restrict construction practices that threaten the shoreline integrity. Of all the threats to water quality this is one of our lake’s biggest from my point of view.
Approximately 40 years ago North Twin Lake residents installed major infrastructure improvements including a municipal water supply and sanitary sewer with lagoon. The municipal water came from two 250 foot wells that have since been retired and replaced by a water line from Rockwell City with its 1300 foot well. In theory the new water source should provide safer water. I mention these infrastructure changes because they have improved drinking water safety and made a marked improvement in the water quality of the lake. Previous septic tank systems very likely included leach lines that allowed liquid sewage to drain into the lake. So in some ways lake water quality has improved during my lifetime.
Our little lake community has seen a fairly significant incidence of Parkinson’s disease and prostate cancer. I have no proof of correlation but it sure appears that our relatively shallow well water may have contained something that contributed to these disease processes. My wife and I have been drinking reverse osmosis filtered water for over a decade to reduce exposure to toxins.
Lake Ahquabi State Park from Bob M.: I visited Lake Ahquabi State Park on May 25, 2025. I arrived at 3:45 p.m. The day was sunny to hazy. The temperature was 66 degrees.
Other than a party of approximately twenty people in the shelter just east of the lake’s beach who were gathered for a picnic, there were three children using the beach and wading in the lake’s water. Two more people, the parents of two of the children, were at the beach, but not in the water. Further north, about seventy-five yards away, from two to five people were using a dock for fishing.
I spoke with the couple who were parents of two of the children wading. They live in Des Moines. The young father had been to Lake Ahquabi once before, as a boy twenty years ago. His spouse had never been to Ahquabi previously. There were no comparative memories of the water and its quality.
The young man was a fisher and a hunter. His fishing has been, primarily, in rivers and farm ponds. He recently had been fishing at a lake in northern Missouri. When I identified myself as a volunteer for the 48 Lakes Initiative and explained our effort, he told me that the lake in northern Missouri has seemed to deteriorate and that the same seemed to be the case on some of the farm ponds where he has fished.
Both of these people did not seem concerned about their young children being in the lake’s water. However, they did share concern about water quality in Iowa and did not question the legitimacy of my concern, as evidenced in the 48 Lakes one-page flyer, which I gave to them, as well as the Jones article.
In my time at Lake Ahquabi, about one hour, I observed less than thirty people at or near the beach area. Only three were touching the water. It was a nice spring day on a holiday weekend.
Pleasant Creek State Park Recreation Area, Palo, IA May 24, 2025 from Libby S.: The forecast for the weekend (the likelihood of rain on Sunday and Memorial Day) should have prompted anyone to be at the Pleasant Creek Beach today. Alas, there were only two kids at the beach and in the water at 1:30 PM. Perhaps most were discouraged by the 66 degree temperature. However the adjacent campground was completely full.
Lake Darling from Rich S.: I used to love swimming with friends at Lake Darling in the '90's. Then "Swimming Not Recommended" signs started cropping up on various days so I was cautious by staying away. Sometimes the DNR's lake testing would state 'safe for swimming' periodically on their website. By 2000 and 2010 there were more E. coli warnings. Algae blooms were more frequent from excess fertilizer nitrogen and phosphorus runoff and CAFO waste discharge.
All this while the state spent millions of dollars draining the lake and publicizing how beautiful the renewed lake would be for the public to enjoy. I also loved kayaking around Lake Darling paddling into the end zone among hanging tree limbs and cattails. But kayaking around 'no swimming' times felt uneasy in the air because of the lakes pollution effects. No fun to be there.
It's all too bad the DNR for years has been powerless lacking strong enforceable regulations and is stuck with inadequate authority to directly mandate changes in agricultural practices. Maybe our strong voices can instigate long overdue changes needed so our legislators can start acting in the public's best health and environmental interests over corporations and special interests wrong doing.
My Lake Darling story is, I used to go up there to swim in the 1980s, as did many others in our community. The water quality started degrading noticeably in the early 1990s and I stopped going there. I was disappointed but not surprised at how the lake’s water continued to slide into unswimmable status, even after the lake was drained and refilled, and millions of dollars were spent on measures to reduce runoff from the lake’s watershed. Most of the lake’s watershed is in Washington County, where CAFOs and widespread application of their manure reigns supreme. Ask the CAFO Industry or the Farm Bureau what’s ruined Lake Darling, and they reply “goose poop.”.
Lake Darling from Patrick B.:
The irony of it all is that this lake was named for Jay Norwood (‘Ding’) Darling, two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist, who was a lifelong advocate for wildlife rights and conservation.