Zebra Mussel
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One culprit for the decline in Lake Michigan’s yellow perch population could be this pesky little mollusk, the species that best represents what can happen when a nonnative species is introduced into an environment. Transplanted most likely from a visiting freighter from the Caspian Sea in the mid-1980s, the zebra mollusk is a ferocious, tough little Eurasian mollusk that found it loved the warmer waters and phytoplankton of the Great Lakes. Problem is, it loves to breed near warm areas—such as at discharge pipes around power plants. They breed so rapidly they create unbelievably dense barnacle-like crusts that do serious damage. Worse, they’re being blamed for the decline if not decimation of native species as they literally suck all the nutrients out of an area. Great Lakes states are frantically fighting a war to keep them from spreading into inland lakes and streams.
© Thomas Huhti from Moon Wisconsin, 5th Edition
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