Friends of Little Wall Lake
Jewell, Iowa
Recent news
Residents Want More Water in Little Wall Lake
Anthony Capps, Ames Tribune Staff Writer
October 12, 2013
The water levels of Little Wall Lake have been on the decline with last year’s drought, and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources has denied a request by local residents to pump water from a nearby drainage ditch into the lake, leaving the future of the popular lake uncertain.
Little Wall Lake is a 250-acre recreational lake south of Jewell in Hamilton County. It is fed only by groundwater with no creek or stream emptying into it.
When the drought last year dropped its water levels, residents figured they’d have to pump water from a nearby drainage ditch. It’s been done before, and the equipment to do it is in already in place. They submitted an application to the Iowa DNR to pump water from the ditch into the lake, but the state environmental agency denied it.
Debate over how to raise water level of Little Wall Lake
Radio Iowa Reporter O. Kay Henderson
October 16, 2013
Residents around Littl Wall Lake near Jewell met with state officials Tuesday to talk about raising the lake’s water level. Jane Todey, who attended the meeting, has lived on the shore of Little Wall Lake for 27 years.
“It’s actually the southern-most glacial lake in Iowa,” Todey says. The 256-acre lake is a “shallow saucer” according to Todey.
“Because it was very shallow, it had been dredged in the ’50s and it was dredged again in 2002 by the Department of Natural Resources and it made the lake a little bit deeper, but the water level because of the drought has been going down and down and down,” Todey says.
LOW WATER: Disagreement Over Little Wall Lake
Posted on: 10:22 pm, October 14, 2013, by Andy Fales
http://whotv.com/2013/10/14/low-water-disagreement-over-little-wall-lake
Little Wall Lake is getting littler.
“It’s not supposed to be a beach, but it is, now,” says Jeff Knutson, walking along the pebble-strewn shore near his lakeside home in Hamilton County.
Two years of drought have dropped the water level more than a foot hurting boating.
“A lot of the lake is now 2-3 feet deep,” he says, ”so your prop is basically running in the muck.”
Knutson and his wife Jane Todey lead the group “Friends of Little Wall Lake” and have petitioned the Iowa DNR for a permit to refill the lake…quickly gathering signatures from more than 700 people.
“About three-quarters of them wanted to use it in more than one way,” says Todey, about the 256-acre lake, ”so more than just fishing, more than just hunting, more than just power-boating.”