Winnecunnet Pond or Winneconnet Pond or Winnecunnett Pond, very often called Lake Winnecunnet or Lake Winneconnet or Lake Winnecunnett although it is a pond rather than a lake, is a body of water in Norton, Massachusetts, United States.[1]
The name also lends itself to the residential area around the pond. "Winnecunnett" (in its various spellings) may be an Algonquian word meaning "beautiful place in the pines".[2]
Location
This 19th-century map shows Winneconnet Pond and surrounding area.
Located on the east side of town (on the north side of I-495), Winneconnet Pond is fed by the Canoe River and Mulberry Meadow Brook (sometimes simply called "Mulberry Brook" and referred to in an 1890 document as "Leach's Stream"[3]).
Winneconnet Pond feeds into a portion of the Mill River known as the "Snake River" before the Mill River feeds into the Taunton River.
According to The Sun Chronicle, at one time the town of Norton's "approximate gateways were Ulmer's Farm on Route 123 and a big turkey farm near Lake Winnecunnett."[4]
Characteristics
Winneconnet Pond is a 148 acres (60 ha) pond in that is part of the Taunton River Watershed. It has an average depth of 5.5 ft (1.7 m) and a maximum depth of 18 ft (5.5 m). According to MassWildlife:
The fertile, stained water is transparent to five feet and the bottom is predominantly mud. The shoreline is heavily developed with commercial and residential buildings except for the swampy areas near inlets.[5]
In an October 2007 town meeting, Winneconnet Pond area residents spoke in favor of allocating a proposed $40,000 in funds to develop a weed control and dredging program for the pond which a spokesperson described “a weed-infested, mosquito breeding swamp.”[8]
Another resident complained, “We're living in unsanitary conditions…People can't sell their homes because we live on a swamp.” A town official said the project would cost the town an additional $15,000 to $20,000 per year besides the initial $40,000 expenditure. Because of these cost factors, the plan was turned down.[8]
In the region where I hunt, in southeastern Massachusetts, the barred owl is decidedly our commonest large owl, but it is none too common at that...The Winnecunnett pair has a record of 26 years, 1905 to 1930, inclusive, though this pair also was much disturbed by cutting in the woods and was obliged to nest in five different groves of pines, one of which was a quarter of a mile away. In all these cases a pair of red shouldered hawks nested regularly in the same tract.[10]
The Patriot Ledger reports that "the town forest, where King Philip's Cave is located, and Lake Winnecunnett are both popular recreation sites."[11] The pond is used for recreational boating and angling. There is a small boat launch at the eastern edge of the pond on Bay Road.
This pond is one of the most popular ponds in southeastern Massachusetts for ice fishing, being one of the first ponds to ice-up and one of the last to lose its ice. Due to excellent access, the pond is heavily fished. Abundant weed growth in the summer can make fishing and boating difficult. In response to this, the town of Norton once purchased and operated a weed-harvesting machine on the pond during the summer. Fisherman can expect catches of chain pickerel and largemouth bass with an occasional northern pike of ten pounds or more...[5]
References
^[1] These spelling and naming variations occurs even in municipal publications and local newspapers. "Winneconnet Pond" and "Lake Winnecunnett" are the two most common versions. Locals tend to refer to it as a lake (as might be indicated by its area) rather than a pond (which it is because of its shallow depth).
^[2] The supposed translation of the name comes from "The Drama of Winnacunnet", a 1938 production concerning Hampton, New Hampshire. Note however that translations of Native American words from this period are often regarded as fanciful.
