Lonewolve wrote:
last I knew the Zebra Mussells clean the water....see Lake Erie
Yea they do. They clean the water of what the other organism's eat. Each one can filter about a gallon of water a day.
Water is definitely clearer which looks nice and gives false perception that it is safer to swim in.
They do remove toxins, or more accurately they store then until they are eaten by something else which then stores them until they are eaten by something else, etc.
What most people don't understand is that a clear lake is not necessarily a healthy lake and is never a fertile lake.
The clearer water is not only less fertile (meaning less food for other biomass at the bottom of the food chain), it increases the amount of sunlight which causes higher algae growth which intern means higher bacteria levels. That plus the increased nitrogen loading which is likely caused by no-til farming and what do you have? Fouled beaches, water quality issues, etc. The increased bacteria is not only bad by itself, it depletes the dissolved O2 resulting in larger dead zones, fish kills and less fish.
These mussels are also likely a source of Avian Botulism.
The harm these mussels cause greatly outweighs any small and mostly perceived benefit because they have relatively few natural predators. Round Goby being one of them which is also an invasive. Mussels store the toxins, gobies eat the mussels, smallmouth bass eat the gobies, ...
And notice I didn't even mention global warming.;-)
just sayin...
We would be better off without them, bit they are here to stay.
