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Indian Lake Ohio and other Ohio boaters

Spillway Project: I know we are all anxious to see the new spillway that we have been hearing about for a couple years...so here are some details from our State Park Manager, George Sholtis:

1. The spillway is in the final design stages and anticipated completion of this stage is the end of 2015

2. Construction project will go out to bid once the plans are complete (projected for early 2016)

3. Construction is anticipated to commence mid-2016

4. There is NO lake draw down planned for the off-season as the community awaits this project

5. There is another Indian Lake in Michigan that also has a spillway construction project ongoing, not to be confused with our own Indian Lake, Ohio.
 
Spoke to DNR agent today and he stated that they plan on even higher traffic at Indian Lake this year.

Mild winter yields to higher boat sales traditionally.

Buckeye Lake looks to be closed for atleast another 20 months.

Grand Lake St Mary's algae is down but a mild spring could affect that.

The tragedy at Alum Creek last year may push small craft elsewhere.

Dredging is behind schedule
 
What happened at Alum Creek?
 
Couple boats racing ran over a young woman skiing. She was here from Australia with a youth group staying at Camp Lazrus.

My house is near Alum and I won't go there.
 
Sorry that haven't been on much. Work issues after 17 years of being loyal have me pretty much near breaking point.


indian Lake has lost some its luster also. Millions spent for dredges that never came near sassafras or Turkey point  Add that to low rain and heat and hit ground twice.  One of the busiest channels and it's less than 2 foot at the entrance wake bouy yest


Rangers have been worthless this year.  


Buckeye Lake traffic is making the lake more crowded- learn the boating laws and etiquette before unloading the trailer.,


I grew up in my families pub but drinking and driving- never. If you are drunk stay off the water. If your boat is overloaded with drunks-stay off the water and catch a ride.


Idiots driving thru ski area on the west side everytime I have the kids out.  Really-people read a map or use common sense. Bunch of tubes and Kids- already crowded- joy ride elsewhere.  Fisherman- I'm one of you. But why drop anchor or trolling lines in the middle of the only wind protected ski part of the lake? Go elsewhere. Cell phone use and boating


Not to say that I'm special but we have invested years on this lake pulling trash, debris and stranded boaters, I was harrased during the 4th with a boat load of family and not a drop of alchohol because my nephew bumped our anchor light off for a whole 3 minutes till I noticed. I understand the law but I just had my boat safety inspected the day before and was treated like a scum bag with no regards to safety.


hottest day of summer and the ranger chased us off the sand bar off Red Oak Island 2 weeks ago. Somebody complained? Really- who. 10 boats with all minor children playing catch. 


Walnut island sand bar has become party central and I cut my foot off a pile of submerged beer bottles. I don't mind everybody enjoying a frosty beverage but bottles on the water? 
 
Myself, I never got into the bar lakes, Indian and Buckeye, because of that reason and the fact that both of them are way too shallow.  I know drinking and boating goes on even though it is illegal in Ohio.  My one buddies brother even sold his toon when Buckeye was drawn down because that was all he wanted to do, go to the bar by boat, and were talking grown man in his fifties ???.  Everybody's got their thing.  Will, I believe common sense is being programmed out of people.  The wife likes Indian lake, we camp and boat and it makes for a nice weekend, next time we are up i'll let ya know.  I do prefer Alum because its close and decent size, but yeah, lots of questionable people.  I'll be happy when Buckeye opens back up so "those people" can go back to it. :p         
 
Sorry to vent- staples in the foot and too many idiots almost running over my kids.


any time your out let us know and we can try to hook up.


we live near alum in Mansard Estates in Galena. Too many ego filled powerboaters at alum for me. 
 
Man sounds like your lake is out of control! 


Time to make a phone call or a visit to a Ranger/Police/County/Lake supervisor or somebody with authority or jurisdiction over your lake........BEFORE somebody gets hurt or killed! 
 
We were having some issues with loud boat and even louder drunks that has been building the last couple years. Now the sheriffs dept has a boat out on the water Saturday and Sunday. Not all day but enough to be noticed and I have seem them stop boats. Word is out they are cracking down and the lake is now quieter. What gets me is they don't seem to care about or enforce the 75db rule. Some of these guys with their thru hull exhaust is just obnoxious. The lake is only 260 acres so how many times can you race around in a circle until you get bored? Moral of the story.....there are lake lice on every body of water. Hopefully your conditions improve willb.
 
Will we could have been one of the idiot joy riders on the west side saturday afternoon/evening as the wife had a nursing friend visiting and we were showing her around the lake.  Went over by old field and then out along the west side shoreline (not through the middle of the ski area) by the lakeview ramp to indianhead and then up into russells point harbor.  


I guess anymore if you really want to enjoy indain lake do it during the week and just hang out at home on the weekends.  I'm at the point of almost hating to go out boating with all the people that probably shouldn't be on the water in the first place.   They are either drunk or have no clue of any boating courtesy or even what a "NO WAKE" bouy means.  Coming out of the channel at micky d's on saturday evening and some ricky bobby thought cutting straight across our bow at the distance of 25-30 feet was ok when he originally looked as if he was going to go down the starboard side and then behind us.  All this in a no wake zone and he surely wasn't going at a no wake speed.....the wife yelled at him (not that it made a difference).


The walnut island swim area has become a circus on the weekends.  We were anchored there last monday (very nice with only 6-7 boats in the area) to clean the toons and give the panels a wipe down,  The wife was floating around in her tube relaxing and I had just gotten back in the boat to get something when a boat full of drunk idiots try (i say that loosely) to anchor about 8 foot away from us when there was 100 foot of area with no boats.  I heard one of them say "you think we are to close to them" and the other idiots response was nah we're good they can move over if we are to close.  YES we did pull both our anchors and move about 50 feet away from them just to be safe.  We left shortly after that when they really got loud....not only music but the f-bomb parade that came out of the one idiots mouth.  Idiot there are young kids swimming and playing about 50 feet from you.  Do you think you could control your mouth for just a little while?


We also got ran off red oak sandbar yesterday by the dnr....he didn't get all up in a huff just told us to leave.  Was 3-4 boats in total of which none were loud or causing a problem  One was a couple that he was cleaning the outside of the boat and she was working on the interior.  Another one was 4 adults and some kids that were wading and throwing a football back and forth.  A runabout boat with a couple just hanging out on the sunpad.   Then us.....the wife was floating in her tube out behind the boat and I was doing a little boat cleanup on the outside.  Not sure who would have been complaining unless the new owners of the little yellow house on fawn island don't care for boaters being that close to them.


Since when is the north side of red oak not a boat swim area?  The dnr told me there are only 3 marked swim area's......little walnut (the circus) - snow island and he said ewing island (about 30 foot of it),  After I checked on a lake map we had I don't see the ewing island area at all but there is a small section on the end of snow island.  Our map actually shows red oak as being a boat swim area.


Lake map
 
I came across this youtube video (I'm sure everyone has already seen it before) but it seems as the next filming of a video like this could indeed come from indian lake.  Retards flying across the lake when it gets rough (yes the lake can get rough even though it's average depth is 5-6 foot) and not paying attention to other boating traffic.  We have way to many people on the lake that have zero courtesy for other boaters or navigational knowledge to make them a safe boater.  I'm all for having a good time at the lake but there is a time and place for everything and drinking and boating (for me anyway) don't mix.....sitting on the deck at home is another story.

 
Looks like they are finally getting started on the spillway project at indian lake.  It's only been a few years since they started talking about having it replaced.  As of now they are saying that the lake won't be drawn down at all while the construction is going on.  Which is good new after the big draw down that has been an ongoing thing for several years at buckeye lake for their dam/spillway repairs


From the aries building:


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Zoomed in from fox island beach:


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Spend a day got rid of both houses (house and doublewide) by the fuel pier and rental boat docks. They are installing all new docks along 308 (orchard island rd) and where the 2 houses used to be is going to be some more docks.  The new fuel pier is a bit wider and longer so they can actually use all 4 pumps.  Hopefully that takes care of backed up boat traffic waiting on fuel every saturday morning and what seems like forever on a busy holiday weekend.


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Not sure how they are planning on doing it.  When they replaced the bridge out to orchard island a few years ago they drove pilings on each side and pumped the water out so they could rebuild the concrete footers and bridge.  Orchard island bridge was closed for almost the whole summer and made for a long trip around from SAD to russells point harbor.  We tend to go under that bridge almost every time we go out. 


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From Pam Miller's (an indian lake chamber member) Facebook post on Friday night.


Hey Friends and Family... going to need all the help I can get.  We are bringing Power Boat Races to Indian Lake Sept. 9 and 10th.  This will be a big national sanctioned race.  I will need people to help.  I'm having a committee meeting on Tuesday, March 21st at 4:30 p.m. at the chamber office.  Need Ideas and MONEY and help.  It is going to cost the chamber thousands of dollars to bring them here.  They have not raced at Indian Lake since the 70's.  If any one would like to help out with the committee or Money or knows of a corporate sponsor I should asked, please private message me. That makes big events in, July, August and September this year.. Lots of planning to get done.  My mind is already going 100 mile an hour.... sleepless nights I'm sure will be a regular thing!  But we will GETTER DONE for all to enjoy!!


GLSM lost the races last year due to the water quality issues they have.  Will be a fun event here at the lake for sure.
 
I can understand wanting to bring tourism money to the area. But this seems like wasted resources for this year.


Get the dredges actually working and the dead trees cleared back a few feet to limit the dead float and you will more and more activity.
 
I am an Indian Lake boater & my Benny did not com with a ski tow bar. Spend a day wants $600 with installation. any alternative suggestions?
 
How do you plan on using the towbar if you get one?  Towing tubes or skiers - young kids or older teens - adults (see older teens).  How much HP do you have and what model boat (standard 2 tube or a tritoon).


Sorry for all the questions but without knowing what you are expecting to do it's hard to recommend an alternative to a ski/tow bar.  Our boat come with it and we have only used it a handful of times. It does work very nice on the rare occasion that we have guests that want to crack out the tubes for the afternoon.


How about a tow harness that you connect to the rear of the boat and tow from there.  Less than $20 and it would be worth a shot to try (we still have one in the package that we bought for our old bayliner).


Listed below are a couple of links to amazon for the tow harness we have.  If you live at the lake we could let you try our harness to see if it would work out for you......we're only weekenders till retirement.


Airhead tow harness without pulley


Airhead tow harness with swing pulley
 
New here and hopefully a resident to IL soon. Rented a boat one day this week from Spend-A-Day. Was a 21' Bennington that we really liked. Like a dummy I didn't get the model #. "21' S" was all I remember seeing.


During our visit there were GIANT logs, busted 2x4's and lots of dead catfish floating around. I also hit something pretty hard with the prop, but never saw what it was and SAD didn't see any damage, so who knows.


I hadn't been boating since I was a teenager (Dad fished all the time and we would camp and ski every year - usually Lake Monroe, Indiana) and while I had fun, the flotsam, speeding boats getting way too close for comfort, and choppy water wore me out. I'm hoping it was just an odd day on the water...figured a weekday would be better than the weekend.


A couple questions...


Is there more junk floating than normal this year? I know we've had lots of rain and wind lately...maybe it's just from that? 


Is there a good place online to get information about living at the lake? Dock rules/requirements, etc? 
 
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