As wakesports continue to grow in popularity, and as wakeboats continue to grow in size, there is an ongoing discussion in many states around the consequences these boats are having on fisheries and lake ecosystems. The central question is whether new restrictions are needed to cut back on large wakes. That debate is now heating up in Kentucky, where state lawmakers just voted to override new wakeboat regulations that state wildlife officials had proposed in December.
The proposed regulations were approved by wildlife commissioners during a Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife Resources Commission meeting on Dec. 5. They would have established 200-foot buffer zones from shorelines and docks on public water bodies where wakesports would be prohibited. This would align with the statewide buffer zones that have been enacted in nearby states like South Carolina and Tennessee in recent years.
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The KDFWR’s proposal would have gone a step further, however, by establishing a list of 17 “wakesport eligible” lakes and banning wakesports on all other Kentucky waters. (Georgia lawmakers tried but failed to enact a similar ban in 2023, when the state’s new regulations around buffer zones went into effect.)
Kentucky legislators acted on the divisive issue in late March by adding an amendment to an existing bill related to fishing on private lakes and ponds. As it’s currently written, the amended version of Senate Bill 39 would prohibit the Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife Resources from announcing or enforcing any regulation that:
- “Prohibits, restricts, or limits using wakeboats or engaging in wakesports on bodies of water where wakeboats were allowed to engage in wakesports as of Dec. 1, 2024; or
- “Imposes a wakeboat zone or prescribes mandatory setbacks or distances from shorelines, commercial docks, or moorage harbors.”
That bill passed through both chambers of the state legislature unanimously, with the House voting Friday and the Senate on Tuesday, according to the Kentucky General Assembly website. The law now awaits a final signature from Gov. Andy Beshear.
Speaking with the Kentucky Lantern on March 27, House Speaker David Osborne, who added the wakeboat amendment, said he had heard from people who opposed the new rules that were proposed by wildlife commissioners in December. He explained that lawmakers would be open to more discussion around wakeboats in the future.
“We just decided to put that in there, and we’ll have a conversation about it going forward,” Osborne said. “These wake boats can cause issues in certain areas, certain instances, but you can’t just arbitrarily ban boats from recreational lakes.”
Making Waves
The “issues” that Osborne referred to have been well documented in lakes across the eastern half of the country, from Minnesota and Wisconsin down to Mississippi and Georgia and all the way over to Maine. These are all places where anglers, waterskiers, and other lake users have been running powerboats for more than 100 years.
Today’s wakeboats are different machines, however. With massive, deep-V hulls and ballast systems that add thousands of pounds, these boats are designed to displace large amounts of water and generate huge waves for wakeboarders and wakesurfers. These rolling, ocean-sized waves are fun to play on, but they can also erode shorelines and stir up lake bottoms, both of which have cascading effects on delicate lake ecosystems. Then there’s the literal rocking of docks and fishing boats, which causes disputes between different lake users.
See the impact wake boats are having on Wisconsin’s inland lakes
A report released by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources in 2023 described the modern wakeboat as “an emerging threat to natural resources in inland lakes.” It cited concerns about the boats kicking up lake sediment, which can lead to fish-killing algal blooms, along with the increased risk of spreading invasive mussels and other species through the filling and dumping of ballast tanks.
“The cumulative negative effects of wake boats on natural resources has the potential to lead to loss of habitat,” the report states, “resulting in the decline of aquatic ecosystems and angling opportunity.”
The DNR’s report concluded that these concerns could be mitigated by having wakeboats operate farther from shore and in deeper water — and by requiring operators to regularly dump and disinfect their ballast tanks.
This report, along with other, similar studies, have led several states to consider new wakeboat regulations over the last five to 10 years. According to the Wisconsin Watersports Coalition, at least eight states have enacted statewide buffer zones prohibiting wakeboats from operating within 200, 300, or 500 feet of shorelines and docks. Some states, like Vermont, have passed additional restrictions on depth.
Read Next: Wake Boats Aren’t Just Eroding Shorelines. They’re Harming Lake Bottoms, Too
Local municipalities and lake communities have also established their own restrictions around wakesports. Wisconsin, for example, doesn’t have any statewide regulations around wakeboats, but dozens of towns there have (or are considering) everything from buffer zones to outright bans. The Wisconsin legislature also introduced multiple bills to regulate wakeboats this session, but those bills are now dead in the water.
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