LAKE COUNTY — A vessel left abandoned at a boat repair business for more than four years will take on an important new role in Lake County”s efforts to protect water bodies from the threat posed by invasive quagga and zebra mussels.
The Lake County Department of Water Resources was offered the older model Bayliner pleasure boat as a donation, which it plans to use as an educational tool in the county”s Invasive Species Inspection Program.
On July 5, the boat was launched into Nevada”s Lake Mead, where invasive quagga mussels were first discovered in 2007. It will remain in the infested waters for more than four months to ensure mussels at all life stages have attached.
The contaminated boat will then be removed from Lake Mead, allowed to dry and covered with a protective spray coating that will hold the dead mussels onto the boat. This process ensures the mussels are dead and pose no subsequent risk.
Upon its return to Lake County, the contaminated boat will become a hands-on tool to train mussel inspectors in Lake County.
“This boat will be an extremely useful tool in our training program,” Water Resources Director Scott De Leon said. “A boat infested with actual mussels will give screeners and inspectors a real-world understanding of exactly what they are looking for when they do an inspection.”
The department collaborated with the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG), Nevada Department of Wildlife and California Department of Food and Agriculture, which operates the state”s Border Protection Stations, to ensure all proper permits are in place to facilitate the transport of the boat.
The department is working with DFG to ensure the boat is available for regional training courses for inspectors involved in other mussel inspection programs across Northern California.
Researchers at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, who are monitoring levels of invasive quagga mussels in Lake Mead, recently reported an estimated 1.5 trillion adult quagga mussels and 320 trillion baby quagga mussels are alive in Lake Mead, which is approximately 10 times the level in 2007.
Dreissenid mussels, which include the small quagga mussel and the smaller zebra mussel, are tiny invasive mussels that can be spread unknowingly from one water body to another on boats and equipment with devastating effects to lakes, boats, docks, water intake equipment, fisheries and beaches.
Cleaning, draining and drying all boats and equipment after exiting any water body can prevent the spread of the mussels. Boats should remain dry on a trailer for one full week prior to launching into another water body.
For more information about preventing the spread of invasive mussels, visit www.nomussels.com, call the Lake County Mussel Hotline at 263-2556 or call the Water Resources Department at 263-2344.
