Cook Lake reopens

Cook Lake is once again open for recreation, but the dam project is not quite finished yet. Delays due to weather mean that the site will likely close again in the spring to wrap up construction, says District Ranger Mike Gosse.

“The Cook Lake project is done for this year, but not completely finished yet. The wintery weather we had in October caused delays in getting the project 100 percent finished,” he says.

“The Bureau of Reclamation crew did a great job in working through some tough conditions and did get the project 85 to 90 percent done. An additional four to six weeks of work will be needed in spring 2020 to completely finish the project.”

The project involved reconstructing the dam and spillway at Cook Lake. Around 60 years old, the old structure was showing wear and tear and allowing leakage.

Around $1.2 million was allocated to the project, which replaced the old earthen dam with four six-foot pipes with a concrete spillway. The new structure will be able handle a much larger volume of water in the event of heavy rain or snow melt.

Most of the major activities have been completed; those remaining mostly involve touch-up work. For the Bureau of Reclamation crew, this includes finishing the left toe drain, completing the shaping and armoring of the emergency spillway, final placement of jersey barriers and cleanup.

For the Forest Service crew, work remaining includes gravel on roads and parking lots, a chain link fence around the bridge and wingwalls, a construction date plaque, reinstallation of water monitor sensors, finish work on the boat ramp and canoe launch and general cleanup.

“It is too soon to know yet if the area will need to be temporarily closed for a short time in Spring to get this remaining work completed or if the remaining work can be completed with the area open to the public,” says Gosse.

The area closure order has now been lifted.

“The water level in the lake is rising and was about five feet below the spillway a couple of weeks ago,” says Gosse. “The state will be restocking the lake in spring, so I would recommend finding a different lake to ice fish on this winter.”