The Lake Ontario Shoreline Resident Information Folders were created to provide shoreline property owners and/or residents with tools and information to help manage their property. The Lake Ontario folder contains a number of informational one-pagers and brochures on various topics related to living along the shore. This landing page provides digital access to the Lake Ontario Folder and its contents. 

Folder Contents (listed by title, alphabetically):

• Lake Ontario Shoreline Resident Information Folder: An introduction

• Consumer Horticulture/Master Gardener Program Services: This document provides information about services offered through the Master Gardener Program at the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Wayne County and provides step-by-step instructions for composting.

• Dogs and Harmful Algal Blooms: This brochure provides information about harmful algal blooms (HABs), how to recognize and reduce the risk of poisoning by cyanobacterial toxins in dogs, how to report possible HABs, and where to go for more information. 

• The Great Lakes Basin: This brochure provides information about the history and geology of the Great Lakes and some of the current issues impacting the lakes such as invasive species, harmful algal blooms, habitat destruction, and pollution. This brochure also unfolds into a large map of the Great Lakes Basin. 

• iMapInvasives: This one-page flyer provides information on iMapInvasives, an online GIS-based mapping tool for invasive species, and how to report your own invasive species sighting.

• Important Contact Information: This document provides a list of county, regional, state, and federal contacts with space to fill in your own local contacts. County level organizations listed on this document are specific to Wayne County, NY.

• Lake Ontario Food Web: This one-page flyer displays a food web showing how energy is transferred within Lake Ontario’s aquatic ecosystem and includes brief descriptions of dominate species in the food web.

• Record Keeping: This document includes recommended activities for residents to help manage their shoreline property, offering an opportunity to create a property map, assess flooding and erosion risk to important property features, and keep track of significant storm events. 

• Salmon and Trout of the Great Lakes: This brochure acts as a visual identification guide to salmon and trout species in the Great Lakes.

• Weather and Climate in the Great Lakes: This document provides background information about how water moves through the Great Lakes system and how lake water levels are impacted by weather and climate. 

• Weather to Go: This rack card provides quick tips for safe boating and potential weather hazards to be aware of. The information on this rack card is offered in English and Spanish

• Your Septic System Folder: This folder, with a topically-relevant contacts and resources lists, will help you learn how a septic system works, how to maintain it, how to prevent and recognize problems, records you should keep, and where to go for more help.


More Info: New York Sea Grant

New York Sea Grant (NYSG), a cooperative program of Cornell University and the State University of New York (SUNY), is one of 34 university-based programs under the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Sea Grant College Program.

Since 1971, NYSG has represented a statewide network of integrated research, education and extension services promoting coastal community economic vitality, environmental sustainability and citizen awareness and understanding about the State’s marine and Great Lakes resources.

Through NYSG’s efforts, the combined talents of university scientists and extension specialists help develop and transfer science-based information to many coastal user groups—businesses and industries, federal, state and local government decision-makers and agency managers, educators, the media and the interested public.

The program maintains Great Lakes offices at Cornell University, SUNY Buffalo, SUNY Oswego and the Wayne County Cooperative Extension office in Newark. In the State's marine waters, NYSG has offices at Stony Brook University in Long Island, Brooklyn College and Cornell Cooperative Extension in NYC and Kingston in the Hudson Valley.

For updates on Sea Grant activities: www.nyseagrant.org has RSS, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube links. NYSG offers a free e-list sign up via www.nyseagrant.org/nycoastlines for its flagship publication, NY Coastlines/Currents, which is published quarterly.