EDITORIAL: Invasive species efforts are vital

Just two days after a check station for boats opened recently in Pablo, state wildlife officials found a pair of boats containing an invasive species of mussels headed north along U.S. 93.

The find was fortuitous because previously that inspection station would not have opened until Memorial Day weekend.

Even though the mussels were dead and the boats had been decontaminated previously in Arizona, the discovery of the aquatic invaders underscores the importance of the check stations as part of a coordinated effort to keep invasive mussel species from becoming established in the Flathead Lake drainage.

An invasive species consultant pointed out that the Columbia River watershed is the last watershed in the United States that doesn’t have zebra and quagga mussels — and it’s hoped the expanded inspections can keep it that way.

Other early-opening stations have been set up at Clearwater Junction and Browning since it was determined that plenty of boats traveling from infested waters passed through our area well before Memorial Day.

Last year there were 37,000 inspections done in Montana and only five vessels had detectable contamination.

But it would only take one contaminated boat to bring about the type of infestations that have caused enormous damage to dams, irrigation systems, docks and other infrastructure in other states.

Flathead Lake, in particular, is a billion-dollar-a-year resource that could suffer greatly if invasive mussels find their way into the lake. The same concerns arise for our other major water bodies — Lake McDonald, Whitefish Lake, Hungry Horse Reservoir — as well as the many other lakes that contribute to the sterling opportunities for water recreation in Northwest Montana.

We applaud the efforts of all the public-interest groups and government agencies to safeguard our waters from boat-borne invaders and hope we can keep our lakes mussel-free.