Syracuse.com - Nature Conservancy checking out Skaneateles and Otisco lakes for aquatic invasive species

HuntingNY-News · July 30, 2013

The team is scheduled to be on Skaneateles Lake on Tuesday, and on Otisco Lake on Wednesday. A community workshop hosted by the team is set for 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Skaneateles County Club.

A closeupof hydrilla, an aquatic invasive plant species.Robert VidÃ©ki, Doronicum Kft., Bugwood.org

The following is a press release:

A five-member "surveillance team" from the Nature Conservancy will be visiting Skaneateles and Otisco lakes and checking the waterways out for invasive species as part of its summer-long tour of waterways in Western and Central New York.

The team is scheduled to be on Skaneateles Lake on Tuesday, and on Otisco Lake on Wednesday. A community workshop hosted by the team is set for 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Skaneateles County Club. To attend, email [email protected].

For more information, see the Nature Conservancy website.

This aquatic invasives surveillance team is comprised of ecology, biology and environmental studies specialists with an array of field work and invasive species management experience. The team will canoe, snorkel and conduct rake tosses in water bodies including Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, the Ohio River, the Finger Lakes and the Erie Canal in search of hydrilla and other interlopers.

Hydrilla was found during the summer of 2011 in the Cayuga Lake Inlet in Ithaca and in 2012 in the Erie Canal in Tonawanda, N.Y. Fragments of the highly invasive plant are easily transported by boats and can also be dispersed by waterfowl and water currents. Once new populations are established, hydrilla may grow up to a foot a day. A multi-agency task force was formed to stop its spread.

This season's field team is charged with hunting down hydrilla and other intruders as well as training community members to find the plants before they get established or transported to other waters.

The effort is part of a large-scale surveillance effort The Nature Conservancy is coordinating throughout New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio to determine where emerging aquatic invasive species exist. The team will survey 400 water access points for aquatic invaders while improving regional and interstate cooperation across the various organizations working on this threat.

"Getting into the water and sampling as many places as possible will give us a better understanding of where aquatic invasive species are distributed," said Gregory Sargis, The Nature Conservancy's director of ecological management in Central and Western New York. "It also gives us an opportunity to connect the dots between the various local agencies and organizations working on this issue, which will help us all have greater impact."

The Nature Conservancy is also exploring genetic testing of hydrilla to figure out where it came from and help close that pathway. "It's like crime scene forensics for plants," Sargis said.

View the full article on The Syracuse Outdoors Blog