13 more species hit Great Lakes

[Hamilton Reef]

13 more species hit Great Lakes via ships' ballast tanks

http://blog.mlive.com/watershedwatch/20 ... _lake.html

12/12/07 Jeff Kart The Bay City Times

Meet the Great Lakes 13.

They're the unlucky number of non-native, aquatic species recently documented for the first time in the ballast water of ocean-going ships that entered the Great Lakes.

Any of the critters could be the next explosive invasive species, joining the zebra mussel and more than 160 other invaders already deposited in the lakes, mostly by marine vessels, argues Corry Westbrook, legislative director for the National Wildlife Federation in Washington, D.C.

David Lodge, a University of Notre Dame professor who helped document the 13 species with colleague John Drake, said seven of the mostly tiny crustaceans are known to tolerate freshwater.

One goes by the name neomysis, and is a cousin to the half-inch long bloody red shrimp, first reported in the Great Lakes from samples collected in Muskegon in 2006, according to Lodge and the federal Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab in Ann Arbor.

The bloody red shrimp comes from the Ponto-Caspian region of eastern Europe - the home of the zebra mussel - eats smaller animals, algae and waterfleas, and may compete with young Great Lakes fish for food.

"There is reason for concern about neomysis," Lodge said.

And his findings are just the tip of the freighter for the Great Lakes.

"Everything we did is a dramatic underestimate for what's in the ballast tanks," said Lodge, director of the Center for Aquatic Conservation at Notre Dame.

"We only collected 20 liters of water from each tank, and we could not identify to the species level most of what we found. ... Our samples are 20 liters out of tons of water and sediments that are in these tanks - literally tons."

The researchers sampled water and sediment from 41 vessels between 2000 and 2002, and published the results earlier this year in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences.

Westbrook, from the National Wildlife Federation, is using the Lodge-Drake study to push for stricter federal regulations on ballast water.

Two bills in Congress, the 2007 Coast Guard Reauthorization Act in the House, and the Ballast Water Management Act of 2007 in the Senate, would put regulations on ballast water discharges in the lakes, and require ships to install on-board treatment systems for their ballast tanks.

But both bills also contain loopholes, Westbrook said, that delay their implementation, pre-empt ballast water pollutants from the federal Clean Water Act and prevent states from enacting their own ballast provisions.

Stuart Theis, executive director of the U.S. Great Lakes Shipping Association in Cleveland, said his group supports the Coast Guard Bill and agrees that something needs to be done about ballast water releases.

"The big key is that it be done on the federal level rather than state by state," Theis said.

Right now, ocean-going ships are required to follow "best practices," and must flush their ballast water at sea before entering fresh waters.

The idea is that the salt water will take care of any invasive freshwater species.
But that's not the case, because ballast tanks aren't designed to fully empty, and water and sediment remains trapped in the bottom of the tanks, Lodge said. Many of the tanks he and Drake sampled were considered to be empty.

"Ballast tanks are entire ecosystems that build up over time and gather species from every port that the ship visits," Lodge said.

Neomysis, the critter of concern mentioned by Lodge, has the potential to cause significant impacts to the Great Lakes, based on the history of the blood red shrimp, which has harmed fisheries in Europe, Lodge said.

A Michigan law that took effect in January 2007 requires all ocean-going vessels to obtain permits to discharge ballast water or conduct port operations here.

The law prohibits any ballast water to be discharged in Michigan unless it's treated by one of more methods, including hypochlorite, deoxygenation, ultraviolet light infiltration and chlorine dioxide, according Barry Burns, a specialist for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality in Lansing.

To date, 92 permits have been issued by the state, but none for the discharge of ballast water, Burns said.

Michigan is an import state when it comes to shipping, he explained. Ships come into the state loaded with cargo, and don't have ballast water. When they unload in Detroit, for instance, they take on ballast water and head to Duluth, Minn., where they take on cargo like grain, and discharge the ballast water, which can spread species around.
"Lakers," or ships that stay in the Great Lakes, are another problem, especially with the discovery of a deadly fish disease known has VHS in Lake Huron and elsewhere, Burns said.

"At this time, the lakers are not regulated ... they transfer invasive species from one lake to another."

Lakers could be regulated in the future, under the Clean Water Act, depending on the outcome of a California court case, Burns said.

The Coast Guard bill, from Minnesota Democratic Jim Oberstar, is expected to be amended to deal with NWF's concerns, according to a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee, D-Flint.

But Westbrook fears the bill won't hit the floor until next year, when the November 2008 elections may further delay a vote.

"While Congress is sitting around, these bad critters are still coming in, and they need to be passing these laws," Westbrook said.

Kildee is a member of the Natural Resources Committee, which has partial jurisdiction over ballast water regulations. He said he's pushing for strong, enforceable provisions to protect the Great Lakes.

"Eliminating aquatic nuisance species and preventing the introduction of new harmful species is a key element to overall Great Lakes restoration," Kildee said in a statement.

One sticking point over the use of on-board treatment systems has been the cost to retrofit existing ships.

Some estimates have put the cost at $1 million per ship. Theis said he believes costs could be lower. If not, ships might stay out of the Great Lakes, he said.

Lodge said that might not be a bad idea, considering that studies have shown the annual impact of controlling just one invasive species, the zebra mussel, in the Great Lakes region far outweighs what it would cost to replace oceanic shipping on the lakes with other forms of travel.

David Lodge, a University of Notre Dame professor who helped document the 13 species with colleague John Drake, said seven of the mostly tiny crustaceans are known to tolerate freshwater.

One goes by the name neomysis, and is a cousin to the half-inch long bloody red shrimp, first reported in the Great Lakes from samples collected in Muskegon in 2006, according to Lodge and the federal Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab in Ann Arbor.

The bloody red shrimp comes from the Ponto-Caspian region of eastern Europe - the home of the zebra mussel - eats smaller animals, algae and waterfleas, and may compete with young Great Lakes fish for food.

"There is reason for concern about neomysis," Lodge said.

And his findings are just the tip of the freighter for the Great Lakes.

"Everything we did is a dramatic underestimate for what's in the ballast tanks," said Lodge, director of the Center for Aquatic Conservation at Notre Dame.

"We only collected 20 liters of water from each tank, and we could not identify to the species level most of what we found. ... Our samples are 20 liters out of tons of water and sediments that are in these tanks - literally tons."

The researchers sampled water and sediment from 41 vessels between 2000 and 2002, and published the results earlier this year in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences.

Westbrook, from the National Wildlife Federation, is using the Lodge-Drake study to push for stricter federal regulations on ballast water.

Two bills in Congress, the 2007 Coast Guard Reauthorization Act in the House, and the Ballast Water Management Act of 2007 in the Senate, would put regulations on ballast water discharges in the lakes, and require ships to install on-board treatment systems for their ballast tanks.

But both bills also contain loopholes, Westbrook said, that delay their implementation, pre-empt ballast water pollutants from the federal Clean Water Act and prevent states from enacting their own ballast provisions.

Stuart Theis, executive director of the U.S. Great Lakes Shipping Association in Cleveland, said his group supports the Coast Guard Bill and agrees that something needs to be done about ballast water releases.

"The big key is that it be done on the federal level rather than state by state," Theis said.

Right now, ocean-going ships are required to follow "best practices," and must flush their ballast water at sea before entering fresh waters.

The idea is that the salt water will take care of any invasive freshwater species.
But that's not the case, because ballast tanks aren't designed to fully empty, and water and sediment remains trapped in the bottom of the tanks, Lodge said. Many of the tanks he and Drake sampled were considered to be empty.

"Ballast tanks are entire ecosystems that build up over time and gather species from every port that the ship visits," Lodge said.

Neomysis, the critter of concern mentioned by Lodge, has the potential to cause significant impacts to the Great Lakes, based on the history of the blood red shrimp, which has harmed fisheries in Europe, Lodge said.

A Michigan law that took effect in January 2007 requires all ocean-going vessels to obtain permits to discharge ballast water or conduct port operations here.

The law prohibits any ballast water to be discharged in Michigan unless it's treated by one of more methods, including hypochlorite, deoxygenation, ultraviolet light infiltration and chlorine dioxide, according Barry Burns, a specialist for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality in Lansing.

To date, 92 permits have been issued by the state, but none for the discharge of ballast water, Burns said.

Michigan is an import state when it comes to shipping, he explained. Ships come into the state loaded with cargo, and don't have ballast water. When they unload in Detroit, for instance, they take on ballast water and head to Duluth, Minn., where they take on cargo like grain, and discharge the ballast water, which can spread species around.
"Lakers," or ships that stay in the Great Lakes, are another problem, especially with the discovery of a deadly fish disease known has VHS in Lake Huron and elsewhere, Burns said.

"At this time, the lakers are not regulated ... they transfer invasive species from one lake to another."

Lakers could be regulated in the future, under the Clean Water Act, depending on the outcome of a California court case, Burns said.

The Coast Guard bill, from Minnesota Democratic Jim Oberstar, is expected to be amended to deal with NWF's concerns, according to a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee, D-Flint.

But Westbrook fears the bill won't hit the floor until next year, when the November 2008 elections may further delay a vote.

"While Congress is sitting around, these bad critters are still coming in, and they need to be passing these laws," Westbrook said.

Kildee is a member of the Natural Resources Committee, which has partial jurisdiction over ballast water regulations. He said he's pushing for strong, enforceable provisions to protect the Great Lakes.

"Eliminating aquatic nuisance species and preventing the introduction of new harmful species is a key element to overall Great Lakes restoration," Kildee said in a statement.

One sticking point over the use of on-board treatment systems has been the cost to retrofit existing ships.

Some estimates have put the cost at $1 million per ship. Theis said he believes costs could be lower. If not, ships might stay out of the Great Lakes, he said.

Lodge said that might not be a bad idea, considering that studies have shown the annual impact of controlling just one invasive species, the zebra mussel, in the Great Lakes region far outweighs what it would cost to replace oceanic shipping on the lakes with other forms of travel.

David Lodge, a University of Notre Dame professor who helped document the 13 species with colleague John Drake, said seven of the mostly tiny crustaceans are known to tolerate freshwater.

One goes by the name neomysis, and is a cousin to the half-inch long bloody red shrimp, first reported in the Great Lakes from samples collected in Muskegon in 2006, according to Lodge and the federal Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab in Ann Arbor.

The bloody red shrimp comes from the Ponto-Caspian region of eastern Europe - the home of the zebra mussel - eats smaller animals, algae and waterfleas, and may compete with young Great Lakes fish for food.

"There is reason for concern about neomysis," Lodge said.

And his findings are just the tip of the freighter for the Great Lakes.

"Everything we did is a dramatic underestimate for what's in the ballast tanks," said Lodge, director of the Center for Aquatic Conservation at Notre Dame.

"We only collected 20 liters of water from each tank, and we could not identify to the species level most of what we found. ... Our samples are 20 liters out of tons of water and sediments that are in these tanks - literally tons."

The researchers sampled water and sediment from 41 vessels between 2000 and 2002, and published the results earlier this year in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences.

Westbrook, from the National Wildlife Federation, is using the Lodge-Drake study to push for stricter federal regulations on ballast water.

Two bills in Congress, the 2007 Coast Guard Reauthorization Act in the House, and the Ballast Water Management Act of 2007 in the Senate, would put regulations on ballast water discharges in the lakes, and require ships to install on-board treatment systems for their ballast tanks.

But both bills also contain loopholes, Westbrook said, that delay their implementation, pre-empt ballast water pollutants from the federal Clean Water Act and prevent states from enacting their own ballast provisions.

Stuart Theis, executive director of the U.S. Great Lakes Shipping Association in Cleveland, said his group supports the Coast Guard Bill and agrees that something needs to be done about ballast water releases.

"The big key is that it be done on the federal level rather than state by state," Theis said.

Right now, ocean-going ships are required to follow "best practices," and must flush their ballast water at sea before entering fresh waters.

The idea is that the salt water will take care of any invasive freshwater species.
But that's not the case, because ballast tanks aren't designed to fully empty, and water and sediment remains trapped in the bottom of the tanks, Lodge said. Many of the tanks he and Drake sampled were considered to be empty.

"Ballast tanks are entire ecosystems that build up over time and gather species from every port that the ship visits," Lodge said.

Neomysis, the critter of concern mentioned by Lodge, has the potential to cause significant impacts to the Great Lakes, based on the history of the blood red shrimp, which has harmed fisheries in Europe, Lodge said.

A Michigan law that took effect in January 2007 requires all ocean-going vessels to obtain permits to discharge ballast water or conduct port operations here.

The law prohibits any ballast water to be discharged in Michigan unless it's treated by one of more methods, including hypochlorite, deoxygenation, ultraviolet light infiltration and chlorine dioxide, according Barry Burns, a specialist for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality in Lansing.

To date, 92 permits have been issued by the state, but none for the discharge of ballast water, Burns said.

Michigan is an import state when it comes to shipping, he explained. Ships come into the state loaded with cargo, and don't have ballast water. When they unload in Detroit, for instance, they take on ballast water and head to Duluth, Minn., where they take on cargo like grain, and discharge the ballast water, which can spread species around.
"Lakers," or ships that stay in the Great Lakes, are another problem, especially with the discovery of a deadly fish disease known has VHS in Lake Huron and elsewhere, Burns said.

"At this time, the lakers are not regulated ... they transfer invasive species from one lake to another."

Lakers could be regulated in the future, under the Clean Water Act, depending on the outcome of a California court case, Burns said.

The Coast Guard bill, from Minnesota Democratic Jim Oberstar, is expected to be amended to deal with NWF's concerns, according to a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee, D-Flint.

But Westbrook fears the bill won't hit the floor until next year, when the November 2008 elections may further delay a vote.

"While Congress is sitting around, these bad critters are still coming in, and they need to be passing these laws," Westbrook said.

Kildee is a member of the Natural Resources Committee, which has partial jurisdiction over ballast water regulations. He said he's pushing for strong, enforceable provisions to protect the Great Lakes.

"Eliminating aquatic nuisance species and preventing the introduction of new harmful species is a key element to overall Great Lakes restoration," Kildee said in a statement.

One sticking point over the use of on-board treatment systems has been the cost to retrofit existing ships.

Some estimates have put the cost at $1 million per ship. Theis said he believes costs could be lower. If not, ships might stay out of the Great Lakes, he said.

Lodge said that might not be a bad idea, considering that studies have shown the annual impact of controlling just one invasive species, the zebra mussel, in the Great Lakes region far outweighs what it would cost to replace oceanic shipping on the lakes with other forms of travel.

David Lodge, a University of Notre Dame professor who helped document the 13 species with colleague John Drake, said seven of the mostly tiny crustaceans are known to tolerate freshwater.

One goes by the name neomysis, and is a cousin to the half-inch long bloody red shrimp, first reported in the Great Lakes from samples collected in Muskegon in 2006, according to Lodge and the federal Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab in Ann Arbor.

The bloody red shrimp comes from the Ponto-Caspian region of eastern Europe - the home of the zebra mussel - eats smaller animals, algae and waterfleas, and may compete with young Great Lakes fish for food.

"There is reason for concern about neomysis," Lodge said.

And his findings are just the tip of the freighter for the Great Lakes.

"Everything we did is a dramatic underestimate for what's in the ballast tanks," said Lodge, director of the Center for Aquatic Conservation at Notre Dame.

"We only collected 20 liters of water from each tank, and we could not identify to the species level most of what we found. ... Our samples are 20 liters out of tons of water and sediments that are in these tanks - literally tons."

The researchers sampled water and sediment from 41 vessels between 2000 and 2002, and published the results earlier this year in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences.

Westbrook, from the National Wildlife Federation, is using the Lodge-Drake study to push for stricter federal regulations on ballast water.

Two bills in Congress, the 2007 Coast Guard Reauthorization Act in the House, and the Ballast Water Management Act of 2007 in the Senate, would put regulations on ballast water discharges in the lakes, and require ships to install on-board treatment systems for their ballast tanks.

But both bills also contain loopholes, Westbrook said, that delay their implementation, pre-empt ballast water pollutants from the federal Clean Water Act and prevent states from enacting their own ballast provisions.

Stuart Theis, executive director of the U.S. Great Lakes Shipping Association in Cleveland, said his group supports the Coast Guard Bill and agrees that something needs to be done about ballast water releases.

"The big key is that it be done on the federal level rather than state by state," Theis said.

Right now, ocean-going ships are required to follow "best practices," and must flush their ballast water at sea before entering fresh waters.

The idea is that the salt water will take care of any invasive freshwater species.
But that's not the case, because ballast tanks aren't designed to fully empty, and water and sediment remains trapped in the bottom of the tanks, Lodge said. Many of the tanks he and Drake sampled were considered to be empty.

"Ballast tanks are entire ecosystems that build up over time and gather species from every port that the ship visits," Lodge said.

Neomysis, the critter of concern mentioned by Lodge, has the potential to cause significant impacts to the Great Lakes, based on the history of the blood red shrimp, which has harmed fisheries in Europe, Lodge said.

A Michigan law that took effect in January 2007 requires all ocean-going vessels to obtain permits to discharge ballast water or conduct port operations here.

The law prohibits any ballast water to be discharged in Michigan unless it's treated by one of more methods, including hypochlorite, deoxygenation, ultraviolet light infiltration and chlorine dioxide, according Barry Burns, a specialist for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality in Lansing.

To date, 92 permits have been issued by the state, but none for the discharge of ballast water, Burns said.

Michigan is an import state when it comes to shipping, he explained. Ships come into the state loaded with cargo, and don't have ballast water. When they unload in Detroit, for instance, they take on ballast water and head to Duluth, Minn., where they take on cargo like grain, and discharge the ballast water, which can spread species around.
"Lakers," or ships that stay in the Great Lakes, are another problem, especially with the discovery of a deadly fish disease known has VHS in Lake Huron and elsewhere, Burns said.

"At this time, the lakers are not regulated ... they transfer invasive species from one lake to another."

Lakers could be regulated in the future, under the Clean Water Act, depending on the outcome of a California court case, Burns said.

The Coast Guard bill, from Minnesota Democratic Jim Oberstar, is expected to be amended to deal with NWF's concerns, according to a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee, D-Flint.

But Westbrook fears the bill won't hit the floor until next year, when the November 2008 elections may further delay a vote.

"While Congress is sitting around, these bad critters are still coming in, and they need to be passing these laws," Westbrook said.

Kildee is a member of the Natural Resources Committee, which has partial jurisdiction over ballast water regulations. He said he's pushing for strong, enforceable provisions to protect the Great Lakes.

"Eliminating aquatic nuisance species and preventing the introduction of new harmful species is a key element to overall Great Lakes restoration," Kildee said in a statement.

One sticking point over the use of on-board treatment systems has been the cost to retrofit existing ships.

Some estimates have put the cost at $1 million per ship. Theis said he believes costs could be lower. If not, ships might stay out of the Great Lakes, he said.

Lodge said that might not be a bad idea, considering that studies have shown the annual impact of controlling just one invasive species, the zebra mussel, in the Great Lakes region far outweighs what it would cost to replace oceanic shipping on the lakes with other forms of travel.

David Lodge, a University of Notre Dame professor who helped document the 13 species with colleague John Drake, said seven of the mostly tiny crustaceans are known to tolerate freshwater.

One goes by the name neomysis, and is a cousin to the half-inch long bloody red shrimp, first reported in the Great Lakes from samples collected in Muskegon in 2006, according to Lodge and the federal Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab in Ann Arbor.

The bloody red shrimp comes from the Ponto-Caspian region of eastern Europe - the home of the zebra mussel - eats smaller animals, algae and waterfleas, and may compete with young Great Lakes fish for food.

"There is reason for concern about neomysis," Lodge said.

And his findings are just the tip of the freighter for the Great Lakes.

"Everything we did is a dramatic underestimate for what's in the ballast tanks," said Lodge, director of the Center for Aquatic Conservation at Notre Dame.

"We only collected 20 liters of water from each tank, and we could not identify to the species level most of what we found. ... Our samples are 20 liters out of tons of water and sediments that are in these tanks - literally tons."

The researchers sampled water and sediment from 41 vessels between 2000 and 2002, and published the results earlier this year in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences.

Westbrook, from the National Wildlife Federation, is using the Lodge-Drake study to push for stricter federal regulations on ballast water.

Two bills in Congress, the 2007 Coast Guard Reauthorization Act in the House, and the Ballast Water Management Act of 2007 in the Senate, would put regulations on ballast water discharges in the lakes, and require ships to install on-board treatment systems for their ballast tanks.

But both bills also contain loopholes, Westbrook said, that delay their implementation, pre-empt ballast water pollutants from the federal Clean Water Act and prevent states from enacting their own ballast provisions.

Stuart Theis, executive director of the U.S. Great Lakes Shipping Association in Cleveland, said his group supports the Coast Guard Bill and agrees that something needs to be done about ballast water releases.

"The big key is that it be done on the federal level rather than state by state," Theis said.

Right now, ocean-going ships are required to follow "best practices," and must flush their ballast water at sea before entering fresh waters.

The idea is that the salt water will take care of any invasive freshwater species.
But that's not the case, because ballast tanks aren't designed to fully empty, and water and sediment remains trapped in the bottom of the tanks, Lodge said. Many of the tanks he and Drake sampled were considered to be empty.

"Ballast tanks are entire ecosystems that build up over time and gather species from every port that the ship visits," Lodge said.

Neomysis, the critter of concern mentioned by Lodge, has the potential to cause significant impacts to the Great Lakes, based on the history of the blood red shrimp, which has harmed fisheries in Europe, Lodge said.

A Michigan law that took effect in January 2007 requires all ocean-going vessels to obtain permits to discharge ballast water or conduct port operations here.

The law prohibits any ballast water to be discharged in Michigan unless it's treated by one of more methods, including hypochlorite, deoxygenation, ultraviolet light infiltration and chlorine dioxide, according Barry Burns, a specialist for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality in Lansing.

To date, 92 permits have been issued by the state, but none for the discharge of ballast water, Burns said.

Michigan is an import state when it comes to shipping, he explained. Ships come into the state loaded with cargo, and don't have ballast water. When they unload in Detroit, for instance, they take on ballast water and head to Duluth, Minn., where they take on cargo like grain, and discharge the ballast water, which can spread species around.
"Lakers," or ships that stay in the Great Lakes, are another problem, especially with the discovery of a deadly fish disease known has VHS in Lake Huron and elsewhere, Burns said.

"At this time, the lakers are not regulated ... they transfer invasive species from one lake to another."

Lakers could be regulated in the future, under the Clean Water Act, depending on the outcome of a California court case, Burns said.

The Coast Guard bill, from Minnesota Democratic Jim Oberstar, is expected to be amended to deal with NWF's concerns, according to a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee, D-Flint.

But Westbrook fears the bill won't hit the floor until next year, when the November 2008 elections may further delay a vote.

"While Congress is sitting around, these bad critters are still coming in, and they need to be passing these laws," Westbrook said.

Kildee is a member of the Natural Resources Committee, which has partial jurisdiction over ballast water regulations. He said he's pushing for strong, enforceable provisions to protect the Great Lakes.

"Eliminating aquatic nuisance species and preventing the introduction of new harmful species is a key element to overall Great Lakes restoration," Kildee said in a statement.

One sticking point over the use of on-board treatment systems has been the cost to retrofit existing ships.

Some estimates have put the cost at $1 million per ship. Theis said he believes costs could be lower. If not, ships might stay out of the Great Lakes, he said.

Lodge said that might not be a bad idea, considering that studies have shown the annual impact of controlling just one invasive species, the zebra mussel, in the Great Lakes region far outweighs what it would cost to replace oceanic shipping on the lakes with other forms of travel.

David Lodge, a University of Notre Dame professor who helped document the 13 species with colleague John Drake, said seven of the mostly tiny crustaceans are known to tolerate freshwater.

One goes by the name neomysis, and is a cousin to the half-inch long bloody red shrimp, first reported in the Great Lakes from samples collected in Muskegon in 2006, according to Lodge and the federal Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab in Ann Arbor.

The bloody red shrimp comes from the Ponto-Caspian region of eastern Europe - the home of the zebra mussel - eats smaller animals, algae and waterfleas, and may compete with young Great Lakes fish for food.

"There is reason for concern about neomysis," Lodge said.

And his findings are just the tip of the freighter for the Great Lakes.

"Everything we did is a dramatic underestimate for what's in the ballast tanks," said Lodge, director of the Center for Aquatic Conservation at Notre Dame.

"We only collected 20 liters of water from each tank, and we could not identify to the species level most of what we found. ... Our samples are 20 liters out of tons of water and sediments that are in these tanks - literally tons."

The researchers sampled water and sediment from 41 vessels between 2000 and 2002, and published the results earlier this year in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences.

Westbrook, from the National Wildlife Federation, is using the Lodge-Drake study to push for stricter federal regulations on ballast water.

Two bills in Congress, the 2007 Coast Guard Reauthorization Act in the House, and the Ballast Water Management Act of 2007 in the Senate, would put regulations on ballast water discharges in the lakes, and require ships to install on-board treatment systems for their ballast tanks.

But both bills also contain loopholes, Westbrook said, that delay their implementation, pre-empt ballast water pollutants from the federal Clean Water Act and prevent states from enacting their own ballast provisions.

Stuart Theis, executive director of the U.S. Great Lakes Shipping Association in Cleveland, said his group supports the Coast Guard Bill and agrees that something needs to be done about ballast water releases.

"The big key is that it be done on the federal level rather than state by state," Theis said.

Right now, ocean-going ships are required to follow "best practices," and must flush their ballast water at sea before entering fresh waters.

The idea is that the salt water will take care of any invasive freshwater species.
But that's not the case, because ballast tanks aren't designed to fully empty, and water and sediment remains trapped in the bottom of the tanks, Lodge said. Many of the tanks he and Drake sampled were considered to be empty.

"Ballast tanks are entire ecosystems that build up over time and gather species from every port that the ship visits," Lodge said.

Neomysis, the critter of concern mentioned by Lodge, has the potential to cause significant impacts to the Great Lakes, based on the history of the blood red shrimp, which has harmed fisheries in Europe, Lodge said.

A Michigan law that took effect in January 2007 requires all ocean-going vessels to obtain permits to discharge ballast water or conduct port operations here.

The law prohibits any ballast water to be discharged in Michigan unless it's treated by one of more methods, including hypochlorite, deoxygenation, ultraviolet light infiltration and chlorine dioxide, according Barry Burns, a specialist for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality in Lansing.

To date, 92 permits have been issued by the state, but none for the discharge of ballast water, Burns said.

Michigan is an import state when it comes to shipping, he explained. Ships come into the state loaded with cargo, and don't have ballast water. When they unload in Detroit, for instance, they take on ballast water and head to Duluth, Minn., where they take on cargo like grain, and discharge the ballast water, which can spread species around.


"Lakers," or ships that stay in the Great Lakes, are another problem, especially with the discovery of a deadly fish disease known has VHS in Lake Huron and elsewhere, Burns said.

"At this time, the lakers are not regulated ... they transfer invasive species from one lake to another."

Lakers could be regulated in the future, under the Clean Water Act, depending on the outcome of a California court case, Burns said.

The Coast Guard bill, from Minnesota Democratic Jim Oberstar, is expected to be amended to deal with NWF's concerns, according to a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee, D-Flint.

But Westbrook fears the bill won't hit the floor until next year, when the November 2008 elections may further delay a vote.

"While Congress is sitting around, these bad critters are still coming in, and they need to be passing these laws," Westbrook said.

Kildee is a member of the Natural Resources Committee, which has partial jurisdiction over ballast water regulations. He said he's pushing for strong, enforceable provisions to protect the Great Lakes.

"Eliminating aquatic nuisance species and preventing the introduction of new harmful species is a key element to overall Great Lakes restoration," Kildee said in a statement.

One sticking point over the use of on-board treatment systems has been the cost to retrofit existing ships.

Some estimates have put the cost at $1 million per ship. Theis said he believes costs could be lower. If not, ships might stay out of the Great Lakes, he said.

Lodge said that might not be a bad idea, considering that studies have shown the annual impact of controlling just one invasive species, the zebra mussel, in the Great Lakes region far outweighs what it would cost to replace oceanic shipping on the lakes with other forms of travel.

[Hamilton Reef]

Intensify efforts to halt invaders

Continuing threats to the places where we hunt, fish and camp illustrate that while things are better than 30 or 40 years ago, all we've really done is slow down the rate at which we are destroying our environment.

Sometimes efforts to turn it around get harder, as under the administration of President George W. Bush, perhaps the worst environmental knuckle dragger in living memory. But even under the better administrations, things have gotten worse, because our system encourages politicians to sell out to those who profit from environmental degradation.

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/arti ... 00567/1058

[Hamilton Reef]

Windsor - Fast-feeding shrimp found locally

Last summer scientists searched for the bloody-red shrimp and found them in Lake Erie near Kingsville, in Lake Michigan and in Lake Ontario. The shrimp that were first spotted in 2006 in Lake Ontario and a canal that connects Lake Michigan to Muskegon Lake have now been discovered in about 20 spots in lakes Erie, Michigan and Ontario.

Meisenheimer said if Canada can't control the dumping of ballast water, it should ban the less than 500 ocean-going ships from coming into the St. Lawrence Seaway each year.

http://www.canada.com/windsorstar/news/ ... 1fec563efb