Here’s why Capitol Lake is about to shrink

Crews are scheduled to begin lowering the water level in Capitol Lake during high tide Monday night as part of a maintenance project.

The 260-acre man-made lake on the Capitol Campus will be lowered by 2 feet so that a contractor can replace screens between the lake and its mitigation ponds next Tuesday and Wednesday, according to a news release by the Department of Enterprise Services.

“The screens are needed to reduce risk of Eurasian watermilfoil fragments spreading from the ponds into the lake,” the news release stated.

Once the project is complete, the lake will return to its normal level, officials say.

Milfoil is an aggressive, nonnative weed that can crowd out other plants and rob water of oxygen. The aquatic invader was first detected in Capitol Lake in 2001, according to The Olympian archives.

This story was originally published June 21, 2017 at 4:19 PM with the headline "Here’s why Capitol Lake is about to shrink."