Fundraiser launched for tech to keep invasive mussels from entering B.C. waters

They may be small, but invasive quagga and zebra mussels pose a huge threat to the environment and economy.

“Mussels will destroy the water chemistry. They will destroy the beaches. Tourism will go away,” said Blair Ireland, chair of the Okanagan Basin Water Board (OBWB).

“You know, we’re talking about hundreds of millions of dollars in impact.”

Many waterways across the United States and Canada are already infested, including the Great Lakes and Lake Winnipeg.

Now, efforts to prevent them from spreading into B.C. are ramping up with a fundraising campaign to accelerate groundbreaking mussel-detection technology being developed at UBC-Okanagan.

‘It’s for detecting boats that were in mussel-infested waters,” said Dr. Michael Russello, a geneticist with UBC-Okanagan who is leading the project. “They may not have obvious signs that they were in those waters.”

Known as environmental DNA or eDNA technology, it involves a portable, suitcase-sized lab that can detect microscopic mussel larvae attached to boats, invisible to the human eye.

“Imagine a handheld, wet/dry vacuum, but modified to have filters that will bind DNA, all DNA that’s on the surface,” Russello explained.

“We would then process those filters with this DNA lab in the field and it would allow for a presence or absence detection of mussels.”

The results are almost instant, according to Russello.

The technology would be a game changer,” said James Littley, chief operating officer for the Okanagan Basin Water Board.

Right now, inspections rely on human checks and mussel-sniffing dogs.

While the canines are considered  the most accurate, resources are limited.

“They’re expensive to train. They take specialized equipment. They have limited working hours and there are only two of those dogs to cover the entire province of B.C.,” Littley said.

Local Rotarians have launched a $100,000 fundraiser to advance the technology, matching another $100,000 donated by the Colin and Lois Pritchard Foundation.

“I spent a lot of my life in the beach of Kalamalka Lake, fishing in Okanagan Lake and I want to ensure that the future generations are going to be able to do the same,” Colin Pritchard told Global News. “And the only way they can do that is to ensure that these mussels don’t get into our watershed.”

While boat inspection stations help prevent the spread of the invasive mussels, Littley said they are only seasonal.which means if you are entering B.C. outside of the season or on routes without inspection stations,

“If you pass an open inspection station, you’re legally required to stop but if you come in out-of-season or on a different route or when the inspection station is closed, there’s no legal requirement to get checked before you launch your boat in B.C. waters,” Littley said.

Littley added that since the province started inspections in 2015, more than 175 mussel-fouled boats have been intercepted.

“The threat is real,” Littley said.

The OBWB has committed $200,000 towards the development of the eDNA technology.

Click here for more information on the mussel-detection technology or to donate.

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