Hudson River Impacts

From September, 1994 (update #22)

MILLBROOK, N.Y. - The first reports of substantially reduced phytoplankton biomass in a river system infested by zebra mussels were given in two papers presented at this summer's annual meeting of the Ecological Society of America. Institute of Ecosystem Studies (IES) biologist Nina Cole reported that an 85 percent decrease in summertime phytoplankton biomass in the Hudson River has coincided with the invasion and establishment of zebra mussels. Models predict that the physical environment in large rivers makes phytoplankton particularly sensitive to benthic grazers such as zebra mussels, Cole said. In a companion presentation, IES biologist Michael Pace reported that zooplankton such as tintinnid protozoans, rotifers, copepod nauplii and the cladoceran "Bosmina longirostris" have declined along with the phytoplankton. Pace and Caraco's observations include several years of phytoplankton and zooplankton collections prior to the Hudson River zebra mussel invasion.

ID: 199409-6.

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.