Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, August 20, 1993 TAG: 9308200094
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LEIGH ALLEN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
But he knows what it looks like - he's got a picture of one taped to his office door. When the first zebra mussel comes rolling up to his Carvins Cove inspection station clinging to the bottom of someone's boat, he'll know what to do: Send that fisherman back home.
Brown is Roanoke's last line of defense against a dangerous - and potentially expensive - invasion.
The dreaded zebra mussels have come all the way from the icy steppes of Kazakhstan in the former Soviet Union to begin knocking on the doors of the Roanoke Valley. And nobody's found a way to stop them.
After arriving in Michigan in 1988 via the bilge water of a Russian freighter, the mussels have undergone a population explosion in the United States, wreaking havoc on water systems around the Great Lakes.
The mussels, about the size of your thumbnail, reproduce at astonishing rates, churning out as many as 30,000 babies each year. And they love water-intake pipes, multiplying on the metal surface until the pipes clog up and kitchen faucets run dry.
Although no zebra mussels have been reported in Virginia, Roanoke is taking no chances on any turning up in Carvins Cove, which provides water to much of the Roanoke Valley. That's where Brown comes in.
His only weapons in this important battle are an inspection shack, sharp eyes and a hefty set of city regulations.
The prefered method of transportation for the mussels is on the bottom of a boat. But they're versatile.
Their microscopic larvae fare nicely in bilge pumps, puddles in boat bottoms and even inside engines. Lacking that, they can survive up to 14 days out of water.
That prompted the city to issue strict new regulations last year about using Carvins Cove. Only fishermen who live in Roanoke, Salem, Vinton or Roanoke, Botetourt or Bedford counties can put their boats into the cove. Even then, the boat cannot have been in any other body of water in the past three weeks and is subject to a thorough inspection.
Brown said most people don't complain about the change, because they know what's at stake. But others say the city may be taking things a bit too far.
"We get a little aggravated with [city Utility Director] Kit Kiser and some of his mussel stories," said Richard Davis while launching his boat for a walleye fishing trip Thursday afternoon. "We feel like the city's trying to make it into their own private pond."
The Vinton man said he and his Salem fishing buddy, Tom Richardson, have been chasing walleye around the cove for 15 years. They said the stricter regulations - such as no aquatic bait, a 9 p.m. deadline for getting off the water and higher launching fees - prevent most people from using the lake like they used to.
City Water Director Craig Sluss acknowledges the change, noting that boat traffic on the lake has declined by about half since the stricter regulations went into effect. He attributes most of that to the ban on fishermen from outside the three-county area, but contends it's a reasonable restriction.
"Those are our customers, the people we sell water to," Sluss said. "The lake is for their benefit. My major concern is the 160,000 people who depend on me for water. If the mussels get in there, they'll shut you down."
Sluss mentioned horror stories from big cites in the Midwest that are now battling full-scale mussel invasions. The reports from the front lines in this war aren't good: Entire water systems have been shut down for days; costs to taxpayers have run in the millions of dollars.
And even though the closest known zebra mussels are hundreds of miles away in Kentucky, they've already cost Roanoke residents a bundle. Boat-launching fees at the cove doubled last year - from $3 to $6 per day for a boat with a 10-horsepower motor - and are scheduled to double again by 1995.
Even that's small potatoes compared to $319,000 the city plunked down this year to have chemical treatment lines put inside the cove's 36-inch intake pipes, which feed the water-treatment plant.
If the city has its way, the new lines - which apply chlorine or other anti-mussel chemicals to the bivalves once they latch onto the intake pipes - will never be used. But Sluss said they're a good investment in case even their best efforts fail to keep the mussels out.
The cost in lost tourist dollars is difficult to estimate. Fishermen said Thursday that before the restrictions went into effect, boats came from Maryland and North Carolina to fish for walleye in the cove.
Last year, Roanoke won a bid to have the Olympic kayak trials at the cove, but was forced to cancel the event once City Council passed the restrictions against out-of-town boats.
by CNB