It is the country\u2019s largest agricultural water district, serving a 1,000 square-mile area from Kerman to Kettleman City, on the westside of California\u2019s San Joaquin Valley.<\/p>\n
FOX26 was there Friday, as crews carried out maintenance on a pump near Five Points along the California Aqueduct.<\/p>\n
![\"{p}FOX26](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/c6713efc-8fe3-4826-9dc2-f01bad19f521-GoldenMussels.jpg\"\/)
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FOX26 was there Friday, as crews carried out maintenance on a pump near Five Points along the California Aqueduct. As they removed the traveling water stream pump, you could see shell after shell. (Photo: FOX26 Photojournalist Bert Montelongo)<\/p>\n
As they removed the traveling water stream pump\u2014 you could see shell after shell.<\/p>\n
They were Golden Mussels\u2014smaller than a the size of a quarter– attached to the pipe.<\/p>\n
Vandergon says the first Golden Mussels were first detected by Westlands in October of 2024. <\/p>\n
\u201cAt that time, we didn\u2019t know what it was,\u201d he says. \u201cWe reached out to our partner agencies and came up with information it was something new.\u201d<\/p>\n
New– and menacing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re ranked one of the top five worst invasive species on the planet,\u201d says Pam Marone, co-founder and executive chair of the Invasive Species Corporation<\/a>.<\/p>\n She says the Golden Mussels feed on just about any microscopic organism.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a freshwater species that can tolerate brackish water conditions.<\/p>\n “I was astonished the density of the populations that I saw where we were collecting some for our work,” Marone says.<\/p>\n The California Department of Fish and Wildlife<\/a> believes the Golden mussels originated in China or Southeast Asia, found in California in October of 2024.<\/p>\n \u201cMost likely, it hitched a ride on one of the vessels that come into our ports\u2014since we found it in the Stockton Delta first,\u201d says Steve Gonzalez with CDFW.<\/p>\n Vandergon says it didn\u2019t take long for the larvae to travel the 120 miles downstream to the site where Westlands crews carried out maintenance.<\/p>\n He says the youngest mussels are virtually invisible — and the multiplication rate is overwhelming.<\/p>\n \u201cIn one year, one mussel can produce over 100-thousand mussels,\u201d Vandergon says. \u201cOnce they start to form as they reproduce, they\u2019ll grow in size and cluster to form a mass.\u201d<\/p>\n And those clusters\u2014are where real problems can occur.<\/p>\n \u201cThat mass can restrict flow in pumps. It can cause damage to equipment,\u201d Vandergon says, pointing to the pump bowl assembly.<\/p>\n He says some mussels have already made it past the pump bowl and into even more pipes in the district\u2019s vast network.<\/p>\n For now, maintenance is the name of the game at the pumps \u2013 at least until there\u2019s a scientific breakthrough.<\/p>\n But Marone says, she\u2019s close.<\/p>\n She\u2019s developed a treatment that consists of naturally occurring bacterium in tablet and granule forms, that would be applied to water.<\/p>\n She says it\u2019s already been used to kill Zebra mussels and Quagga mussels\u2014also invasive species.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve recently retested it, tested it again against golden mussels and found it also kills golden mussels,\u201d she says, adding field testing will be taking place this fall.<\/p>\n She says Invasive Species Corporation is awaiting approval by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency\u2014a process delayed by the recent federal government shutdown.<\/p>\n So far, legislators on the state level have had some success with bringing attention to the problem.<\/p>\n