Great Lakes exports mussels, advice and reporter to Texas

A clump of invasive zebra mussels. (Photo: U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service)

A clump of invasive zebra mussels. (Photo: U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service)

Clean, drain, dry is common advice among the Great Lakes boating community.

Now it’s delivered with a southern drawl.

The watercraft maintenance practice limits the spread of invasive species between lakes. And now it is used in Texas to limit the further spread of a Great Lakes menace threatening lakes in that state.

Zebra mussels are again the target.  They entered the U.S. through the Great Lakes aboard freighters that inadvertently transported them from Eurasia. They were first noted here in 1988 and have since drastically altered the region’s ecology.

And they continue to stake out new territory. The Nature Conservancy has an interesting animation depicting their spread across the nation.

Now they are in a dozen Texas lakes since first reported in that state five years ago.

And the Texas Parks & Wildlife Commission recently required boaters to drain wells, bilges, motors, bait buckets and other water-intake systems before launch, the Midland (Texas) Reporter-Telegram reports. The commission has also banned transferring live bait caught in one lake to another for the same reason.

First time violators could get hit with a $500 fine. Second time offenders could get up to a $2,000 fine and 180 days in jail.

Rachael Gleason

Rachael Gleason

The advice and the mussel aren’t the only thing exported from the Great Lakes to Texas.

The Midland Reporter-Telegram story is by former Great Lakes Echo reporter Rachael Gleason, who reported extensively on invasive species while here.

You can take the reporter out of the Great Lakes, but you can’t take Great Lakes-related news out of the reporter.

 

 

 

 

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