The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service scheduled treatments in Lake Michigan to exterminate the lamprey larvae to preserve other species.
Lampreys are jawless fish that sucks the blood of other marine animals and is considered a pest in the North American Great Lakes beginning of the early 20th century. It feeds on the lake trout, salmon and walleye in Lake Michigan. They are called invasive species as they have no predators in the lake so they keep multiplying.
The agency will start the treatment on June 4 and will end June 15 in the Mitchell Creek stream bottom. The coverage of the treatment will pass the Traverse City State Park before going to the east of Grand Traverse Bay.
The agency acknowledges that it is impossible to get rid of the adult lampreys so it is best to attack the larvae while they are still vulnerable to poisonous chemicals. The treatment is said to be up to 99 percent effective in exterminating the larvae.
Heather Hettinger, a fisheries biologist with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, said in an interview with Journal Star that they have been battling with the lampreys for over 50 years along the most local waterways that connect with Lake Michigan- such as the Betise and Platte rivers. The government has already spent over $400 million just to get rid of these pests and had reduced the lamprey's population to up to 90 percent. The treatments are done to ensure that their number will not increase over time.
Biologists use toxicants called lampricides which is harmless to other species. The process is expensive but good enough while scientists are still developing other treatments that can actually exterminate the adult lampreys. There are also barriers built in the upstream to block these pests from reaching the lake.
