Residents of the small northern Ontario community of Willisville, south of Espanola, say delays in replacing an aging dam have left the local waterway in an historic drought. The population of Willisville is about 200 people, with another 50 cottages in the area. Most draw their drinking water from the nearby Frood Lake. The plunging water level is affecting the community in many ways, including local industries. “You can’t run a fishing camp if you don’t have any water,” said Dan McGuire, owner of Charlton Lake Camp in Willisville. The drought forced officials to end the tourism season early, in a community that dealt with major spring flooding. “They opened the dams above us before they opened ours and it just overwhelmed us,” McGuire told CTV News. “The two lakes above us are bigger than ours. So, if you let water … it’s like letting a lake into a bathtub. Of course we flooded.” The spring flooding delayed the start of the tourism season by about a month. The water shortages forced operators to close about a month early. “Everybody went from ‘we’ve never seen water this high’ to ‘we’ve never seen water this low,’” said Marian Sonntag, co-owner of Bearskin Lodge. “Re-marking shoals, pulling logs out that have been coming up from the bottom from the flooding. Now with it being even lower, you’re just seeing stuff you’ve never seen before,” added Bearskin co-owner Duane Sonntag. Along a waterway called the Narrows, a narrow channel between Frood Lake and Cranberry Lake can no longer be accessed by boat. The water is so low that never-before-seen shoals are well above the surface. Although it was a dry summer, most of the problems with the water levels are connected to the nearby Frood Lake Dam, which has been leaking for at least two decades. Residents said the Ministry of Natural Resources has known about the problem for more than 25 years. The MNR has confirmed that Frood Lake Dam will be replaced next year. “Since 2023, the ministry has announced investments of nearly $100 million to rehabilitate 16 dams across Ontario, one of them being the Frood Lake Dam, which is being replaced,” the MNR said in an email. “The environmental assessment process is nearing completion, and detailed design work is well underway. With these planning and design activities continuing to advance, construction of the replacement dam is planned for the spring.” The residents said they don’t understand why such a critical project is taking so long. “We seem to be well down the list, and our point is that we’ve got the worst situation of any of the lakes in this area,” McGuire said. “We need to be further up the priority line.” Given the fluctuating water levels this year, they are leery about planning for next season. “We’re reconsidering our year for 2027 and how early we actually want to book people in because we don’t have the confidence that we’re going to be able to access our property,” Marian said. “It’s become a dire situation,” said John Mastin, of Whitefish. Mastin is a third-generation cottage owner on the Cranberry-Frood-Charlton Lake system. His grandfather is the late Franklin Carmichael, a well-known Group of Seven artist who painted the La Cloche Mountains at Willisville. “He fell in love with this area back in the ‘20s, stayed and built a cottage,” Mastin said, adding that his sisters still own the Carmichael cottage on the lake. “I’ve been on the lake 70-plus years … In that time, I’ve never seen the water this low.” Normally, Mastin would take his boat down the narrow channel from the docks in Willisville to his water-access-only cottage on Cranberry Lake. “It’s getting to the point where we can’t even access our own properties,” he said. “The maintenance (of the dam) is terrible … Something has to be done -- and it’s got to be done now.” Mastin would like to see a temporary fix to stop the leaking at the dam, while the tourism operators want water to be let out of dams further upstream, particularly on Panache Lake. They all said the nearby quarry shouldn’t be allowed to pump huge volumes of water from the lake.
