Thanks for the advice! Before I head out and set this up though can someone answer two lingering questions?

1. Is the radioshack ministate antenna any good? If so how would I fix the broken coaxial cable? I did some digging and it looks like a multi-directional antenna. Any range figures?

2. Where in my backyard should I try to place the new tower? I'm sure at 25 feet it has a clear view of the lake and stuff. But with all the posible interference factors I've shown in my backyard, what's the idea place? Should I place it closer to my house, or farther away near the back fence near the power lines? Or somewhere in between? The tower is massive so there isn't much room for trial and error in actual placement so advice here would REALLY help!

3. A preamp is nice, but at the moment the antenna on it's own seems to be picking up the distant buffalo signals strongly fairly consistently. Is there any real benefit to having one in my situation? It's $100 for the CM7777. Are there cheaper alternatives?

Another reception report for today:
Today I got 26-1 and 26-2 for the first time! Fairly choppy for 5 minutes and quickly dropped out. All other major Buffalo stations rock solid at 80% except WKBW which bounces between 30-80%, and PBS which remains very problematic. No ION. Didn't see FOX today. CHCH coming in choppy consistently, and got a trace of CBLT again this afternoon. No other Canadian channels.