LAKEPORT–Mussel-sniffing dogs demonstrated nasal abilities during the filming of a Public Broadcasting System documentary segment Thursday afternoon at Library Park.
Dead samples of the tiny, invasive quagga mussels were planted on two boats for the dogs to find.
One mussel, no bigger than the tip of a fingernail, was “hidden” in plain view on the outboard motor of a boat belonging to business owner and bass fisherman Ross England, who volunteered his watercraft for the demonstration.
“The dogs are much better at it,” Department of Fish and Game warden Lynette Shimek told producer Huell Howser.
Finding it proved a tough proposition for a human bystander, who eventually asked Shimek to point out the two places where the dead mollusks were planted. Ellen, Katie and Leo, three Department of Fish and Game dogs brought to the Fifth Street boat ramp, found it and others that were not visible in less than a minute each.
Howser”s cameras captured the action for the PBS series Living With Nature, which is a statewide program sponsored by the Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA).
According to ACWA Communications Supervisor Lisa Lien-Mager, the episode filmed at Library Park will focus on ways water agencies throughout the state have to bring their operations in line with nature.
The series has aired 18 episodes so far, according to Lien-Mager.
Howser interviewed Mic Stewart of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California about the invasive quagga mussel, a cousin of the zebra mussel, and its effect on California”s waterways.
Stewart said the non-native zebra mussel came over to the United States from the Ukraine in the ballasts of commercial boats anchored in the Great Lakes in the 1980s, and were overrun later in the same decade by more aggressive quagga.
According to ACWA spokesman Bob Muir, quagga infestations spread east from there, and the mollusk was first found in California in January 2007.
Since then, he said, the zebra has been found at other points in Northern California, and the quagga has been found throughout the state.
Lien-Mager said as part of the same episode, footage was also taken in Butte Creek, where passageways were improved for salmon.
The date the show will air has yet to be announced, according to Howser.
Contact Tiffany Revelle at trevelle@record-bee.com.
