Zebra Mussels

By Brett Welch

Everyone likes a good underdog story, and this is just that.

Nearly 35 years ago, news reached the Coulee Region: zebra mussels had been discovered in Pool 8 for the first time. Most people already knew about the damage they were expected to cause to native fish populations in the Great Lakes, where they had been introduced only three years earlier. In that brief time, they had spread from Lake St. Clair throughout the Great Lakes.

Biologists were concerned that the same ill effects might also decimate native fish and freshwater mussel populations here. Millions of dollars were allocated to find a method of control and millions more to clean intake pipes and vessels of the invader. There did not appear to be any real solution.

Here we are today and so are the zebra mussels and in addition another similar invasive called the Quagga mussel. Not here in large numbers yet, but present. Still a problem but the collapse that was feared has not occurred. In fact, based mostly on observation they are less in numbers. It used to be that every solid object left under the water's surface was quickly covered with them. That does not appear to be as true today. While any boater that leaves their boat in the river for the summer knows it is still a chore to clean them off at the end of the season. That is unlikely to change.