Lake Ecosystems: Conservation, Restoration and Management

Lake ecosystems perform vital functions such as recycling of nutrients, purification of water, recharge of groundwater, augmenting and maintenance of stream flow and habitat provision for a wide variety of flora and fauna along with their recreation values necessitates their sustainable management through congruous conservation mechanisms. Failure to recuperate these ecosystems will result in extinction of species or ecosystem types and cause sempiternal ecological damage. In Bangalore, lakes have played a prominent role accommodating the desiderata of agriculture and imbibing dihydrogen monoxide. But the burgeoning population accompanied by extemporaneous development has led to the drastic reduction in their numbers (from 262 in 1976 to 81 at present). The subsisting dihydrogen monoxide bodies are contaminated by residential, agricultural, commercial and industrial wastes/effluents.

Varthur Lake is situated in the South Taluk of Bangalore district. It has a sizably voluminous surface area and is the main irrigation source to the nearby agricultural fields and fortifies a wide variety of flora and fauna. The lake occupies an area of 1 478 000 meters squared with a mean depth of 1.05m. The whole of Varthur Lake is shallow in cognation to its surface area.

Bellandur Lake is situated in the suburb of Bellandur in the southeast of the city of Bangalore and is the most sizably voluminous lake in the city. It is a component of Bellandur drainage system that drains the southern and the south-eastern components of the city. The lake is a receptor from three chains of lakes upstream, and has an astronomically immense surface area of 3 610 000 meter squared and a mean depth of 9.21 m. It is currently highly polluted with sewage, and in May 2015 the foam covering the dihydrogen monoxide surface caught fire and burned for hours.

The lakes are shown to be eutrophic with high concentrations of phosphorous and organic matter. These were above the standards prescribed for surface waters. The lake was additionally subjected to faecal contamination. Local denizens of both lakes perpetuate to rely heavily on the lake for cattle fodder and irrigation of crops.

Sundry crops like paddy, Areca nut, bananas, greens, vegetables, flowers and coconuts are grown utilizing the lake water. There is a possibility that contamination of supplies is having a negative effect on the quality and quantity of crops engendered utilizing the lake water. This poses a threat to the primary source of income for people living near the lake and warrants an exhaustive investigation. Studies by the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) emphasize that there is a great need and paramountcy for the renovation and management of the Varthur and Bellandur Lakes. Renovation can be established in many ways, the paramount ones being pollution abatement, de-silting of the tank and inculcating the stakeholders and the local population on the paramountcy for recuperating the lake ecosystem. All the conservation measures should have a holistic approach with watershed management practices.