Algae left its mark on Minnedosa water park

The inflatable water park at Minnedosa Lake suffered financially this year because of algae, the business owner said.

Splish Splash Water Park saw a significant drop in sales starting early August and lingering until the end of summer, Gerry Champagne, owner, told the Sun in October. The drop came after an algae alert warned people to stay away from blooms on the lake.

“There’s a couple of days shortly after the warning hit the internet, where it was 25 degrees and there was nobody there, like, literally nobody,” Champagne told the Sun. “We opened that (next) weekend, and we’re lucky if we saw 10 people.”

The remainder of the season was stained with that perception of toxic algae, he said. Almost a month passed before people returned to the water park, but customers never returned in full.

“The sales didn’t bounce back — let’s say they dropped 90 per cent. Well, it probably got back to about 50 per cent,” Champagne said. “We probably broke even or lost money this year.”

The water park had to lay off all four part-time staff to cope with the change in business, he said. The park was never able to hire the staff back for the season, however the team hopes some of the local lifeguard staff will return for 2026.

“I feel bad for those kids, like I said, they were looking forward to earning summer money and that kind of stuff, but it’s out of our hands at that point.”

At the end of July, the Province of Manitoba put out blue-green algae advisories for several lakes in Manitoba, including Minnedosa Lake. Staff collected water for testing, and staff at the Town of Minnedosa also put out a public warning to residents to avoid contact with large green scums of algae.

The province’s test results later found zero toxins in the water, but it had been about a week, and public perception appears to have been damaged for the year, Champagne said. While it’s unfortunate for the business, he said it’s understandable that people avoided the lake.

“If I saw a posting that said, ‘Algae bloom; don’t drink; rinse off; don’t go in,’ I wouldn’t have put my kids in there, so I understand where everybody came from,” he said.

The water cleared up in the next few weeks following about 104 millimetres of rainfall upstream of Minnedosa Lake. But the water park was still struggling to attract people back to the lake at the time and water park manager Connor Champagne, Gerry’s son, said people were just starting to return.

Going forward, the Splish Splash team is exploring options to introduce new equipment next year to try to have a recovery season. They had not made any final decisions as of early October.

Champagne said the business also plans to grow its Facebook page, Splish Splash Minnedosa, to spread news so it has better communication with customers if something happens again.

When the water had cleared up this summer, the team was posting about it on Facebook, trying to get the word out, but didn’t have the reach they hoped, he said.

Because the local lake committee is exploring a few options to combat algae on the lake, there are things to be optimistic about moving forward, Champagne said. It was also the first time they’ve had to close because of algae since opening in 2019.

“We just have to take (the good with the bad),” he said. “If I can’t complain when it’s great, I shouldn’t complain when the weather turns south.”

In the past few years, weather has been great for the relatively new water park, he said.

Lake committee member Barry McPhail told the Sun this summer that algae on the lake is tied to damage at the spillway. Repairs to the infrastructure could help by sealing off the lower area, so that the surface, where algae sits, flushes better.

Silt deposits at the north side of the lake also contribute to the issue, Minnedosa Coun. Grant Butler told the Sun in August. The silt flows in from the upstream river, the Little Saskatchewan River, and has stacked up over time, becoming an increasing contributor to algae blooms, and will need to be tended to in the near future, he said.

» cmcdowell@brandonsun.com