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closeA costly menace now threatens the 80-percent-complete Nacimiento pipeline project. It isn’t the menace of lawsuits by disgruntled water-bill payers. It’s the menace of damage by shellfish the size of pats of butter.
They are quagga mussels from Ukraine who sneak rides on boats and ships. They and their smaller cousins, zebra mussels, have done billions of dollars of damage to water-works and hydroelectric plants back East.
Their strength is in numbers. One female produces half a million offspring a year. Swarms of them attach in layers to almost any surface, including the insides of pipes and the outsides of docks. They clog intake screens and boat motors.
They devastate the environment. They eat every little thing. In some water where you could barely see 12 inches down, they clear it to 12 feet down. Nothing remains for other creatures. Quaggas accumulate so much toxic material from the water they become poisonous. Many birds that eat them die.
Their microscopic larvae are invisible in boats’ bilges, bait tanks and water tanks. Thus they can be trailered from lake to lake.
Quaggas arrived in California in 2007 by way of the Colorado River and spread to 20 Southern California aqueducts, reservoirs and lakes — some within 200 miles of our county.
Zebra mussels migrated in 2008 to a small reservoir near Hollister within 100 miles of San Luis Obispo County.
Our county recognized the threat. In 2008 it started inspecting and decontaminating boats at Lopez and Santa Margarita lakes.
Nacimiento Lake has no such program; it’s more complicated. Yes, it’s in our county but Monterey County owns it, except for 17,500 acre-feet per year, which they’re obligated to give us.
Now we’re building a pipeline to distribute most of our Nacimiento water. We don’t want any quaggas or zebras choking the pipeline’s pipes or valves.
The pipeline is costing $176 million, not counting the millions Paso Robles and San Luis Obispo are spending on treatment plants.
Screening boats for quaggas at Nacimiento Lake will be tricky. It’s mostly surrounded by private property, not government land. There’s lots of private lakefront where people could launch uninspected boats.
All that now stands between our costly Nacimiento water and stray quaggas are some warning and educational signs. Carolyn Berg, Nacimiento project engineer, said our county will suggest further security measures at an October meeting with Monterey County.
In September 2007, the bonds to finance the Nacimiento pipeline were sold. In December 2007, construction began. I guess nobody thought to shout, “The quaggas are coming. The quaggas are coming.”
I hope I’m not too late.
Contact Phil Dirkx at phild2008@sbcglobal.net or 238-2372.
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