Rice Lake-Steele and Dodge counties, according to a DNR press release this will start going down this spring but we probably won't see any mud until summer and fall, a one year drawdown as it will probably fill up next winter, easy access through Rice Lake State Park, check the DNR website for the press release
Swan Lake-Nicollet County, this is a drawdown that has been going on all winter in an effort to freeze out Carp, the warmest winter in years kept the oxygen from going down enough so the drawdown will continue throughout the year, hopefully it will be dry enough to freeze out the Carp next winter, stories have been in the sports section of the Minneapolis paper, access will be tough, looking at lake depth maps it appears that the public access areas are some of the deeper bays in the lake. so walkable mud will be tough to access from those areas, but who knows, also questionable is what vegetation growth we will see, we will be trying to get access and will let you know what we find, anybody else who tries needs to keep the rest of us informed, this is a very large shallow lake, roughly 4 by 6 square miles with many islands, bays, vegetation outcrops, etc, a lake this large can attract untold thousands of shorebirds If you know of any other drawdowns please let all of us know. Good shorebird sites always change from year to year. Dennis and Barbara Martin dbmar...@skypoint.com