What does future hold for UK’s largest freshwater lake?

London: After a summer of blue-green algae, bathing bans, and pondweed and silt causing problems for boats, Belfast City Council has officially added its voice to calls for Lough Neagh to be brought into public ownership.

It is also home to the largest commercial wild eel fishery in Europe.

And sand-dredging, though controversial, has been a business on the lough for over a century.

The lough and its catchment area is also a vast ecosystem, where species such as the curlew and the barn owl could be found in years gone by.

It has numerous environmental designations – special protection areas, special areas of conservation, areas of special scientific interest and Ramsar status.

And the peatlands that surround it are a potentially huge carbon sink, helping to fight climate change.

What’s gone wrong?

The blue-green algal bloom over the summer has caused havoc, not just in Lough Neagh but right up to Northern Ireland’s north coast.

Water from Lough Neagh flows down the Upper Bann and into the Atlantic Ocean at the Barmouth between Portstewart and Castlerock in County Londonderry.

That brought the algae to the coast, where it could not survive but caused a bathing ban on several beaches at the height of summer.

Some traders blamed the effect of those bans for putting them out of business.

Anglers have been advised to “catch and release” fish that have been within Lough Neagh because of the risk the algae poses.

The bloom was the result of settled weather, invasive species and water pollution mostly due to agriculture.

Excess fertiliser runs off from fields into the water, taking growth-stimulating nitrogen and phosphorus into the lough.

Almost two decades ago the zebra mussel invaded the lough.

Ownership of and responsibility for Lough Neagh does not sit with any single department or group

It filters water, making it clearer and allowing the sun’s light to penetrate deeper into the depths.

That, combined with the excess nutrients from fertiliser – eutrophication – caused the algae to “bloom” or grow rapidly.

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The algae compounded the woes of rescue volunteers who were already worried about safe access due to silt building up.

Pondweed is also a prominent invasive species in the lough.

And the lough is showing signs of the effects of climate change, with water temperature now more than a degree higher than in 1995.