Are mussels in Phoenix irrigation, drinking water canals?
Last Update: 10/30/2008 7:05 pm
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By MEGAN THOMAS
Cronkite News Service Click the play button on the video window to the see the storyQuagga mussels have reached the connection between the Central Arizona Project and Salt River Project and likely have gotten into the system that carries irrigation and drinking water through the Phoenix area, officials said Thursday.
The invasive species poses no threat to the public, but the quagga mussel and its cousin the zebra mussel wreaked havoc on drinking water and power plant intakes in the Great Lakes region before the quagga infested lakes along the Colorado River in early 2007.
“We know it will be a cost to our maintenance costs; we just don’t know what the effect of the mussel will be,” said Jeff Lane, an SRP spokesman.
The mussel is thought to have made it into central Arizona via the CAP canal and has infested Lake Pleasant north of Phoenix.
Eleven of the mussels were found by SRP employees on concrete blocks the utility company put in the canal connection to detect the quagga. No mussels have been found SRP canals yet, according to a joint news release from SRP and the Arizona Game and Fish Department.
“We assume the mussels are now in our canal system,” Lane said.
“It’s going to cost time, energy and manpower, and we’re all going to see that in our bill,” said Rory Aikens, a public information officer for Game and Fish. “That’s why it’s important to stop the spread of quagga mussels. It’s going to cost all of us.”
Game and Fish encourages boaters to avoid transporting the quagga by cleaning, draining and drying boat hulls and intakes.
The CAP offers quagga mussels a route to continue spreading south toward Tucson, Aikens said.
“There’s a likelihood, a very good possibility, that the quagga mussel will continue spreading,” Aikens said.
Quagga mussels, which are native to Eastern Europe, breed rapidly and build colonies that can block water flow, requiring expensive efforts to scrape them from water intakes, boat docks and other places they favor. They also are voracious eaters, draining ecosystems of nutrients low in the food chain and endangering fish.
In 2007, SRP introduced the redear sunfish, known for its ability to crunch mussel shells, in hopes that it would help control quagga mussels if they reached the Phoenix area. But Lane said the utility has since determined the fish wouldn’t be as effective as hoped.
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Copyright 2008 The E.W. Scripps Co. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
