Invasive quagga mussels are causing quite the headache for Idaho officials.
What’s happening?
Three years after they first appeared in the Snake River, the European mollusks are still posing a threat. A pair of Department of Agriculture employees just completed a round-the-clock effort that they hope will be the final step in a tough process, the Idaho Statesman reported.
Chief treatment engineer Jeremey Varley and bureau chief of invasive species, noxious weeds, and range programs Nic Zurfluh worked 18-hour days for two weeks, ensuring a copper solution infiltrated every nook and cranny of the river to poison the small species, whose hardiness, microscopic larvae, and rapid reproduction allow it to “spread exponentially.”
The goal is to keep the mussels out of the Snake to protect all of the Columbia River Basin, which stretches across seven states and two Canadian provinces.
“Eradicating the mussels requires constant calibration of the copper levels in the water, a complicated task that demands everything from scuba dives to dozens of water samples each day,” according to the newspaper.
The department’s treatment method had never before been attempted in such an environment, which includes “deep holes in the riverbed and marshy areas along the shoreline,” as the Statesman described.
Why is this important?
Varley said the invasive species could collapse the lower end of the food chain in the Snake. The mussels can also clog and damage irrigation pipes and hydroelectric equipment, threatening the agriculture and power industries as well as drinking water supplies.
In the United States, invasive species cause $20 billion in annual expenditures via damage to resources and mitigation efforts.
“As you get closer and closer to zero with any invasive species, the harder and harder it gets because they’re spread out or hard to find,” Zurfluh told the Statesman. “Think of weeding out your garden. If you have a whole garden, you’re like, ‘OK, I can just start tackling it.’ But how hard is it to find the last weed?”
What’s being done about quagga mussels in the Snake River?
While the mussels may be gone for now — results of the treatment will be known next summer — it has come at a cost. In August, the Statesman reported that up to 90% of invertebrates in the river had been killed where the first eradication attempt took place in 2023.
Among the dead were decades-old sturgeon, and 7,000-plus pounds of toxic copper lined the ecosystem. That first treatment alone cost $3 million.
Still, this alternative was better than allowing the mussels to take over and crowd out native species by hogging resources. That trade was one officials were willing to make to avoid the problem that has beset places such as Wisconsin, where quagga mussels have inundated lakes.
This highlights the necessity of education and responsible recreation. The state inspects boats and has long asked boaters to clean, drain, and dry their vessels.
“The game is not over. We’re still going to keep after it,” Varley said. “[But] we really wanted to make sure we left no cards on the table after we were done.”
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