Mussels Sighted on Boats at Inland Lake

From January 31, 1991 (update #6)

Recent reports that zebra mussels have been "found" in lakes in the Ohio River drainage basin should be taken with a grain of salt, according to Ken Paxton, assistant administrator, Fish Management and Research, Ohio Department of Natural Resources. Paxton said adult mussels were found on two boats trailered to Indian Lake in west central Ohio after spending most of the summer in Lake Erie. The boats remained on Indian Lake for about five weeks during September and October. But Ohio DNR personnel found no mussels during inspections of pilings, riprap, buoys and other hard substrate in Indian Lake and 13 other inland recreational lakes that have received interlake boat traffic. "We looked at a lot of substrate in all those lakes, and we didn't see any zebra mussels," said Paxton, noting that the Indian Lake sighting occurred after the mussels' prime reproductive period. However, Paxton added that it's "only a matter of time" before the mussels are found on inland Ohio lakes.

ID: 19910131-4.

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.