zebras in Millbrook

[zboss]

I am always interested in meeting new people and checking out new gear... like many newly certified divers I have spent A LOT of time reading and reading about, procedures, gear, and DIR vs. the world, etc...

I wasn't aware that there were multiple "beaches"... I assume they are mostly rock. What is the visibility there right now?

 

[zboss]

O-ring once bubbled...


We will come by and say hello if we see you...we usually go off beach 1 which is where you will most likely be.

I had heard that there was an equipment demo day coming up this weekend or next... are you with that group?

 

[O-ring]

I wasn't aware that there were multiple "beaches"... I assume they are mostly rock. What is the visibility there right now?

I may be wrong, but I think there are 10 beaches. Beach 1 is the easy entry point and where most people go since it starts shallow before it hits a wall and drops off (right before the first platform). I have never been off anywhere other than beach 1, but I know a guy that dives off beach 8 or 10 or something all the time (Divernva on the board).

The vis is pretty variable...I would guess 10-15' maybe...when a lot of people stir it up it goes from 3-10' or so. MikeS said it was about 30 feet last weekend, so maybe it will hold up!

I had heard that there was an equipment demo day coming up this weekend or next... are you with that group?

Nope, we are just checking out some new gear amongst ourselves. There are a group of us in the local area that dive together pretty frequently and are always looking for new buddies.

 

[divernva]

... drops down to 50' feet close to the shore. Then continues to about 80'. Vis is normally a little better since less people enter the water out there. It's a longer walk to the water entries than Beach 1.

Ken

 

[caymaniac]

Since I live by Lake Michigan, I'll give you some info on why the zebra's are bad. One mussel per year can reproduce over one million offspring. If you dive without gloves the zebra's can slice your skin like paper cuts (personal experience). In about fifty years our beautiful sand beaches will be filled with dead shells. The perch have nearly disapeared. Actually, the zebra's aren't so bad, its the damn gobies that are taking over!
;-0
Caymaniac

 

[O-ring]

This Sat. at 10am on beach 1...we have about 4-5 people showing up so far, anyone else is welcome (except people I have offended in posts on scubaboard).

PM me if you need directions, etc.

 

[Goldminer]

Bob3 once bubbled...
The chance of divers carrying zebe larvae is slim; chances are they were brought there in the feathers of those flying garbage cans, seagulls.
Read up on the zebra mussels at: http://www.angelfire.com/ca/divers3/zebramussels.htm

Allowing the gear to dry in between dives will kill the larvae, (not the mussels themselves though).

Bob3 once bubbled...
If your dive gear has a chance to dry out, the larvae will be killed. The zebes w/shells can last a day or more out of the water if kept damp.
You'd almost have to go directly from an infested area to the non-infested area to have dive gear be a viable transport.

It's a federal crime to intentionaly transport without a permit.

Bob3:

What about the water retained inside a BC's baldder? They stay wet for weeks or months. One of the stages in most mollusc's life cycle is a tiny larvae with no shell which floats around. It is easy to trap and transport such critters in large numbers inside a BC bladder.

How do you disinfect and/or dry out a BC bladder?

 

[Tractor Tom]

Aside from the obvious problems with the little buggers pluging up intakes and vents, they cause a some of us who keep boats on Lake Huron to do a little more maintenace on the boats. The little guys will attach to any surface of a boat that is not painted with toxic bottom paint, like inside the through hulls for the bilge pump on my sailboat and plug it up. Also, an effect of them clearing the water in Saginaw Bay, is the Walleye Pike are moving into deeper water. Seems like the Walleye like dark water, and now that the water in the bay is Gin Clear in the spring, the walleye head for the deeper water to stay away from the light.

 

[BilgeDog]

Salt water will not kill zebra mussels because they originally came from salt water. More and more marine life is addapting to our fresh water in ontario. The St.Lawrence river separating New York and ontario has Salt water sponge, that is adapting fairly quickly to fresh water. The sponges i have seen in quarrys as well as smaller lakes. They filter the water 10 times as fast as zebra mussels can. The zebra mussels will pretty much all die off as soon as their is no more silty particles in the water. So once the visiblity gets good, the zebra mussels will die off. And then it will get bad again, and thats when the zebra mussels return. Without them our lakes would look like the red river in winipeg, and from a chopper overhead it looks like puddle of mud. Just let the zebra mussels do what they were ment to do, and If you want to kill them, Rinse your gear in Ice water. They die in the freezing cold, and with lack of calcium.
Canada will be the first place to get their own soft coral reefs. Which will do more damage then zebra mussels. And will eventually over run the zebra mussels.