invasive species,    new zealand mud snail,    russian river

New Zealand Mud Snails Discovered in Russian River: How Do We Stop This?

By Tom Chandler 9/18/2008

And the invasives keep marching on (from the Ukiah Daily Journal):

The New Zealand mud snail, an invasive species of pest, has been discovered in Russian River waters.

Never before found in Mendocino County, the small aquatic snail is known to have been in California since 2000, stated a news release from the Mendocino County Department of Agriculture.

Salmon and trout populations may be harmed by the spread of the snail, the county stated.

One mud snail can grow to a population of 40 million mud snails in a year, the county stated. About 500,000 mud snails can fit inside the space of one square yard. A full grown mud snail can grow to a size of about 1/8 inch.
The New Zealand Mud Snail isn't controllable and really can't be eradicated (yet). Still, anglers can help prevent the spread by freezing their gear for six hours, or using one of a handful of other eradication methods.

It's clear anglers are responsible for the spread of many invasives, and introducing another rubber-soled wading boot is far from the whole answer.

I'm open to suggestions from the Undergrounders. And I know a handful of industry types read the Underground, so make 'em good.

For example, how many fly shops now offer decontamination stations? For that matter, is anyone selling a "decontamination station in a box"?

How many gear manufacturers offer innovative wet bags that allow you to step out of your waders, then soak (and tumble) them in a cleaning solution?

For that matter, are wading boots are designed to handle repeated freezings - or dunkings in industrial strength Formula 409?

Frankly, I don't know, but I think it's time we found out.

The NZ Mud Snail infected floor is yours, Undergrounders. Any ideas?

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AuthorPicture

Tom Chandler

As the author of the decade leading fly fishing blog Trout Underground, Tom believes that fishing is not about measuring the experience but instead of about having fun. As a staunch environmentalist, he brings to the Yobi Community thought leadership on environmental and access issues facing us today.

23 comments
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Cab: I wear Weinbrenners (cheap wading boots don't protect my feet or ankles very well on the tough rivers I fish), and at $120 a pop, I think buying ten pairs isn't an option.
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My personal contribution to the invasives containment effort: buy one (cheap) pair of fishing boots for each waterway. I suppose that 2 pair of hippers and/or waders should be sufficient- one pair to dry out, while I wear the other. Mostly all I use is boots, anyway- I prefer to wet-wade, as long as the air temperature is above 60 degrees (or 55 degrees, if the fish are rising.) Really, in the grand ... more scheme of fly fishing paraphernalia, boots run cheap. You can buy 10-20 new pairs of Chotas or Hodgmans for the price of one new high-end fly rod (or to put it another way, one pair for less than 1/2 a tank of gas.) Just be sure to ID them with the name of the river, stream, or lake where you use each pair...
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I am curently working on NZMS and quagga mussel programs. The ONLY environmentally safe and effective control for all these invasives, including Didymo, is to assume that all waters you enter are infested with something. Because you don't see it, don't assume it's not there. Therefore having several pairs of boots and completing cleaning and drying them is the best methodology. Formula 409 does not ... more completlely kill mudsnails. The DFG study used a flawed protocol as they didn't check the treated snails for 48 hours. All the snails were dead after 48 hours. Follow-up studies in my lab showed that the snails briefly recovered and moved around for up for several hours, plenty of time to spew young snails if translocated to other waters.
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Brent: Copper sulfate pentahydrate seems like a viable control, but it's not readily available (yet), and it is toxic to fish in all but very low concentrations. I wonder if it isn't time for an innovative company to come up with a less-toxic control method. Market hates a vacuum, and somebody could make a few bucks off this issue.
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A visit to Ralph Cutter's excellent web site might help with this. www.flyline.com/environmental/nzms/ It would appear that copper sulphate i,for now, the best solution for preventing the spreading of the snails. There is also a link to California's Fish and Game site for a more detailed picture of the problem. When I look at waders with the old fashioned attached boots I can't help but notice that ... more there are almost no areas that the snail can hide in, especially if the boots were fitted with rubber soles.
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Lowell: Sadly, I'd have to agree - there aren't a lot of options, though some of the ideas posted do offer a little promise, whether in the gear or treatment arena. Decon bag? Pocket irradiator? Hmmm. The idea of single-water waders make sense, but given the rapidly aging fly fishing demographic - and our increasing tendency to forget our own names - a pair of NZ-infected boots seems like an invitation ... more to spread the disease simply by grabbing the wrong pair. Damned if we do, damned if we don't. I froze my gear before and after my Montana trip (hoping to kill everything crawly or otherwise unfriendly), but there was little hope of doing so while camping there (which ended up OK as we didn't move much between watersheds). It's a biggie, no doubt.
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Yes, of course I should have mentioned Patagonia - they were a major funder. Ken Davis was instrumental in designing and carrying out the tests, and anglers from a number of fly fishing clubs in the area participated. The point I really want to make, though, is that there are really only a couple of effective practical methods to treat gear that anglers are likely to use. Freeze it overnight (at least ... more 6 hours) or use two sets. Drying works, too, but only if you get it completely dry for about 30 days. That's not very effective. I'm still hoping one of the streamside treatments will be effective, but it looks like the snail is going to continue to spread to more waters. It only takes one snail from one angler to colonize a new creek or river.
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Lowell: Thanks for the link. I understand Patagonia was also a funder of the Putah Creek tests. Where it gets confusing when you factor in all the other invasive species; Didymo can be killed by saltwater, Zebras are very resistant to drying, etc. Manufacturers should be looking not at just sole material, but also at using materials (fabrics, adhesives, etc) that can withstand common treatment methods ... more like freezing, chemicals, etc.
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The most accurate information on how to treat your gear can be found at http://www.putahcreektrout.org/NZ_Mud_Snails.html. Bleach and regular Formula 409 will not work! And bleach may ruin your gear. The Northern California Council Federation of Fly Fishers has funded scientific studies of various treatments, and has found that the best remedy is to freeze your gear for 6 hours. It also works to have ... more a set of gear that you use only for NZMS-infested waters, but of course that costs money.
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My thoughts were that with the current methods, it takes a lot of time and/or effort and/or toxic solutions to decontaminate the gear, so to innovate we need something that reduces all three. So we need something easy, for our lazy soles, biodegradable, and smallish. The problem with washes is that you need a lot in order to cover wet gear, and who wants to deal keeping gallons of bleach; storing ... more or recapturing them. Also, with water based solutions the surface tension makes it difficult to cover a surface well, so a wetting agent is needed, but then you need to wash it off... too much work. 1. Think big ziplock bag with a valve and reversed hand pump. Add a couple cups of solution, and suck all the air out of the bag with gear in it. The vacuum pressure forces the solution into all the little pores and gaps in the gear, so only a little is needed. 2. Bleach and 409 are too toxic too dump out, and storage is hard, so some better chemicals are needed: a. Ammonia is super toxic, biodegradable, but hard on fisher and will make rubber and plastic gear brittle. b. Lime Away won't kill the beasties but will make them homeless, but can't dump it anywhere, and who knows what'll do to gear. c. Brewers sanitizer like Star San, Saniclean, IO Star or others; many are self foaming, so a little will go a long way, and designed to kill microbes. They are biodegradable and safe (in case you want to drink from your boots), but I'm not sure if they are strong enough to kill snails. 3. My next thought is to get away from liquids and turn to a fogger. Think zipplock again with a RAID roach bomb thrown inside. If the stuff can kill a roach it should do a number on a snail. Since its a gas it'll get in to every nook and cranny, but leave nothing behind; it can be left to dissipate into the air without clean up, though I'm not sure what its made of, and I'm guessing not great for the environment in general. Another issue is that it is flammable and in current form is way to big for this sort of thing, but a mini fogger or aerosol can product would probably work. Anyway thats all I got...
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Jean-Paul: Is that a UV irradiator in your pock... ahh, the hell with it.
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Pocket UV irradiators. I should secure the patent for that one. Not only could you kill rock snot and the mud snail, you could use it to activate the Tuffleye epoxy for fly tying, cure the Loon UV repair products, and disinfect your brownliner hamburger of E. coli, Dairy Queen style.
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Tom, I am thinking you should fish barefoot the next time you come East. Seriously though, this is a great chance for some innovator to come up with an answer. All this talk of the new Vibram sole has me thinking of digging out my Golden Retriever old work boots. Back when I first started fly fishing they worked just fine albeit a bit slippery. Lee
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Most solutions being touted as killing NZMS are toxic and can harm your wading gear. The highly touted 409 solution is no longer being made. Freezing hurts the glues used in boot construction. Same with microwaving (but both will guarantee eradication of invasives). There really is no effective and reliable solution other than letting your boots dry out completely for at least a week in the sun. That ... more also has problems with UV damage. My solution is to use one set of wading gear exclusively in known NZMS waters, but even that's only a partial work around.
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Michael: It's everything. Felt soles no doubt provide a more secure hiding place than a rubber sole (rubber's easier to clean), but the top of the wading boot is covered by seams, laces, straps and a tongue -- all of which can provide a transportation vector for invasives. Waders - especially gravel guards (and especially neoprene ones) - are also likely to retain things like New Zealand Mud Snails, ... more which are very tenacious. You know those knee patches on some wader designs with the hole in the bottom to drain water? That doesn't look good. More on this soon. The Russian River was probably contaminated by an angler or a boater, but I do know it's not good news for the species struggling to hang on its already degraded environment.
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It's clear anglers are responsible for the spread of many invasives, and introducing another rubber-soled wading boot is far from the whole answer. Tom - is it the felt, or the whole boot, or something even more. Personally, I wash the heck of my stuff each outing. And when I switched to the removable soles, I started soaking the felt in a mild bleach solution overnight. Is that enough?
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Of course, complicating matters is the simple fact that invasives are notoriously uncooperative beasts; saltwater kills didymo, but apparently has little effect on Mud Snails. And so it goes. Still, weigh in, Undergrounders.
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Kidding aside, this is a great area for "Systematic Innovation" that could a) make some $$, and b) help the environment that fly fishermen care about. Some "repellents" could be studied that aren't that threatening to common materials. Without repellents you would need decontamination. (Or maybe the best strategy is both, so that neither has to be "strong" chemicals. Hmmm...) Consider a tub or box ... more that is big enough for you to dunk or agitate the potentially contaminated gear in. You would also need a treating solution, I presume. Make the tub such that the bottle can be poured into it, then the bottle fixes to a connect point (say after treating). You treat your gear, remove and dry/store/whatever. You tip the tub up and the liquid drains back into the bottle. Cap everything and you're ready to go again... Hey, it's brainstorming! (Too bad I often suffer from nearly terminal braincalms.)
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When I fished in New Zealand the guides carried small basins and a premixed solution containing bleach. Waders and boots were washed for a set period of time before going in the water and before stowing the gear in the truck. I thought I saw signs posted in some locations indicating you had to comply with this pracitce. It is true that felt may be tough to get really decontaminated due to the high ... more surface area.
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And yes, I've been thinking about my decontamination bag: Rolls out so it's easy to get your gear in it (maybe you strip off the waders while standing on it), seals tight so you can pick it up by a string and twirl it to distribute liquid, then has a drain that allows you to easily drain off cleaning fluid for re-use. Of course, as ChileUnderground pointed out in a Google Talk conversation (he's one ... more of those product design/quality genius geek types), what happens to the cleaning liquid that's retained on the wading boots?
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Wading condoms? I can see the marketing gaffes already (and yes, I looked away quickly) Singlebarbed, you're growing more cynical, and frankly, I couldn't be more proud.
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I'm hoping to have audiences with those who have the best science in the upcoming months so I can develop reliable, no-transport gear for the future (we've had proprietary sticky rubber since 2005). I'm unclear on the exact carrying capacity of the many other components of angler wear that can store and transport aquatic bad guys (gravel guards, neoprene, laces, mesh, insoles, etc) but know in my ... more gut that these parts aren't nuisance free. I am personally interested in figuring out good solutions to felt disinfection too because I believe it's still a fantastic outsole choice for grip....but that may be a tall order. I'm glad that this problem has become mainstream enough to get the wider fly fishing industry's attention. Hopefully good solutions will come of it.
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Wading Condoms, strip it off after wading and drop into the incinerator at the parking area. I figure the industry is concerned enough to sell them for about $300 each. Invasive repellant, like waxing a surfboard prior to use, a ritual wherein you treat your waders with some horrible caustic agent that prevents hitchhikers from tagging along. Ban all boats and wading, fish from the bank like everyone ... more else - this practice is common in drinking water lakes. Disposable velcro soles, detach the "felt" and drop in the waste can. A velcro bond to the disposable material would likely hold quite well. I figure the industry is concerned enough to sell them for about $300 each.
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