Sunrise, 6:27.

 

Write about anything you want in the comments. This is just my recording of the fact that the sun came up this morning, and I was witnessing the predictable but glorious occasion in my usual place beside the lake they call Mendota.

Lake Mendota originated after the Wisconsin glaciation, which occurred approximately 15,000 years ago. Glacial ice, which had covered the Madison lakes... at a thickness of over 300 meters, began to retreat northwest about 14,000 years ago.... Although a large lake that stretched from the northern part of Lake Mendota down to Stoughton did exist for about 1,000 years, falling water levels caused this large lake to separate into the four current Madison lakes about 10,000 years ago, leaving numerous shallow-water marshes between those lakes. ... 

Lake Mendota and Lake Monona are separated by an isthmus known as the Madison Isthmus, on which the majority of Madison, WI, is located....

We are honored to live on the isthmus. My usual place for viewing the sunrise is a peninsula, and I think a peninsula is a fine place for a sunrise run. But an isthmus is the perfect site for a house. 

On a typical summer day, the lake is filled with those engaging in water sports, including boating, fishing, water skiing, wakeboarding, tubing, canoeing, windsurfing, kayaking, and sailing.

I have never seen anyone water skiing on Lake Mendota. Or wakeboarding or tubing. But those other things, yes, but never anything close to "filled" with people doing these things. It's a big lake, and it's mostly empty, as you see it in my sunrise photos.

The Wisconsin State Capitol and much of the state government is located on the narrow Madison Isthmus, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus is situated along the southern shore of Lake Mendota. In the early 20th century, Chancey Juday and Edward A. Birge founded an influential school of limnology.... Lake Mendota has been called "the most studied lake in the world," with the UW–Madison Center for Limnology resting on its southern bank.... 

In March 2021, researchers from the Center for Limnology concluded that climate change and the associated lengthening of summer weather have driven the annual formation of dead zones in Lake Mendota, which are oxygen-deficient layers deep in the water column. These dead zones have been shown to remain in the lake for up to two months in the summer and have the potential to devastate the habitats of benthic fish.

Benthic fish — I just learned — are the ones that lie around on the bottom of the lake. As they lie on their side, one eye migrates around to join the other eye on the same side of the head. And that's called metamorphosis.