Indiana Update - Lake Wawasee Water Clarity Declines

From October, 1995 (Update #25)

Adult mussels were found this summer for the first time in Kuhn Lake (Kosciusko County), Maxinkuckee Lake (Marshall County) and Lake James (Steuben County). Veligers were also found in water samples collected from Dewart Lake (Kosciusko County) and Lake James. Kuhn and Dewart lakes are 10 miles from Lake Wawasee, one of the first infested inland lakes in North America. Lake Wawasee water clarity, measured in a Secchi Disk monitoring program, declined in August to pre-invasion, 1989 levels, according to a Lake Wawasee Property Owner's Association newsletter. While early summer water clarity was called "remarkable," a long, intense algae bloom began in July and continued through August. Whether these developments were connected to the presence of zebra mussels is being considered by researchers Dave Garton and Ladd Johnson, who are examining the ecological impact of zebra mussels on several inland lakes, including Lake Wawasee.

ID: 199510-13.

The Zebra Mussel Update was a 4- to 8-page quarterly national newsletter published by the University of Wisconsin Sea Grant Institute from May 1990 through May 1997. The ZMU documented the spread of the zebra mussel -- an exotic nuisance mussel -- through North America's freshwater environments, especially the Great Lakes, and on efforts to control it.