We are 7 days into treatment, and have reached 100% mortality of the zebra mussels samples in the small 0.61 acre area surrounding the access. As of today, we are currently at 36% mortality in the larger, 29 acre site. We expect to see more mortality in the coming days, hopefully reaching 100% by Friday, but no guarantees.
As far as non-target impacts, the Dissolved Oxygen crashed pretty early, there has been a small fish kill composed of a couple pike, several bullheads and some small perch. The majority of the dead fish seem to be bullheads, mostly really small ones. They are not numerous, you have to drive through the water lilies to see them. There are still a lot of fish swimming around, and since we are at 100% mortality in the small area, we cut a few zip ties at a couple seams in the barrier to hopefully allow fish to get out of that area. The native mussels we had in our sample cages are also mostly dead, there is still one alive in the larger area. As far as vegetation, we saw very early impact to Coontail, its mostly gone from the channel. Sago Pondweed and Eurasian Watermilfoil remain fairly abundant.
We’ve had three bump treatments since the initial treatment, with another small bump likely tomorrow. Concentrations seem to be holding fairly steady now. We’ve used 1300 gallons out of the 2100 gallons that were initially ordered so far. We will likely have some left over, I’ll work with the manufacturer on our options for any leftover chemical.
As far as the access reopening, Carver County will make that decision. I think we’ll have a really good idea on how realistic that is in the next couple days.
