This photo from 1996 shows the process by which artificially high lake levels destroyed the old growth forest front at Songo Beach. Note the freshly scoured and eroded soil and the exposed root systems. Now compare the trees with the colored arrows in the 1996 photo to the same scene in July 1999.

---

This is the same group of trees, from the opposite direction, in July 1999. Note that the large red pine in the foreground of the 1996 photo has toppled and its entire trunk has been cut and hauled off by Sebago Lake State Park personnel to clean up what has now become the "beach" at Songo Beach.

---

These two photos of Songo Beach, taken eight years apart, show that all of the old growth red pine trees with red arrows in 1996 had been toppled, killed and removed by 2004, leaving only the two trees with yellow arrows still standing. These red pine trees were between 100 and 150 years old.

It goes without saying that not only was Songo Beach itself destroyed during the period 1987 to present; but an outstanding old growth shoreline forest of red pine, pitch pine and white pine was destroyed as well. And all of this destruction was done to Sebago Lake State Park, a State Park owned by all of the people of the State of Maine, including the tiny children playing on the freshly cut tree stumps

All of this destruction was done with the authorization and permission of the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.

To add insult to injury, the tax dollars of Maine people and the daily use fees paid by park visitors were and are used each year to pay Sebago Lake State Park employees to cut up and haul off each of these majestic pine trees after they topple over and die.