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[Water_news] 1. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS - Top Item for 3/20/07

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation for DWR personnel of significant news articles and comment

 

March 20, 2007

 

1.  Top Item

 

Crews find more destructive mussels in aqueduct

Riverside Press Enterprise – 3/19/07

By Jennifer Bowles, staff writer

 

Crews inspecting the aqueduct that brings Colorado River water to millions of Southern Californians have found almost 800 quagga mussels since March 10 in the largest discovery so far of the tiny but destructive mollusks in the West, officials said.

 

The discoveries were a sign that the thumbnail-sized mollusks could create havoc in a major water source for the region.

 

In the Great Lakes, the invasive mussels from Ukraine have created a billion-dollar problem by clogging water pipelines and altering ecosystems.

 

But officials here were buoyed by the fact the rapidly reproducing mussels were sparsely distributed downstream of Copper Basin, a reservoir along the aqueduct in eastern San Bernardino County, according to a letter dated Friday from Jeffrey Kightlinger, general manager of Metropolitan Water District, which owns the aqueduct.

 

In all, 778 mussels were found in siphons within 20 miles west of the basin, the letter said.

 

The discoveries were made during a routine maintenance shutdown of the 242-mile aqueduct that ends in Lake Mathews near Riverside. Metropolitan used the time to search for the mussels in the aqueduct's eastern-most sections.

 

Divers conducted underwater inspections at two reservoirs and examined forebays, sand traps and sumps, according to Kightlinger's letter to employees. Fifty siphons will be inspected for mussels during the shutdown, he said.

 

The aqueduct will remain drained through March 27.

 

The mussels were first discovered in the West at Lake Mead National Recreation Area in early January. Within weeks, a few mussels were found farther downstream in the Colorado River and in the aqueduct. #

http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_mussels20.3d74dec.html

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