Clear Lake boating regulations in limbo

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This article was published 14/12/2023 (1017 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

ONANOLE — Parks Canada has not yet decided on boating regulations for the 2024 boating season on Clear Lake but hopes to make a decision by the end of February, Riding Mountain National Park Supt. Leanne Coopersaid yesterday.

Despite a clump of zebra mussels being found free floating in Clear Lake this summer, Parks Canada staff say they’re not sure if the aquatic invasive species has been established in the lake.

“We’re discussing it with First Nations, we’re discussing it with scientists, we’re looking at all the different things,” Cooper told more than 60 people who had gathered in Onanole on Tuesday night to discuss the problem of zebra mussels — an aquatic invasive species that have wreaked devastation in Prairie lakes across Canada — in Clear Lake.

Parks Canada staff set up information bulletins and were on hand to answer questions at the Onanole Rec Centre, located 95 kilometres northwest of Brandon.

As the Sun previously reported, samples collected from Clear Lake in Riding Mountain National Park indicated the presence of environmental DNA (eDNA) for zebra mussels. The samples, collected in the summer, show the eDNA present at Boat Cove throughout the season.

The eDNA was found despite Parks Canada’s ramped-up efforts to keep the aquatic invasive species out of Clear Lake this summer, which included requiring boat operators not to have used their craft in any other body of water this year and that all boats pass an initial inspection before receiving a permit to access Clear Lake.

Parks Canada enforced the new rules by installing tags to attach boats to trailers, which informed staff the vessel had not been in another water body and possessed no risk of bringing aquatic invasive species into Clear Lake.

If the tags were removed, cut or tampered with, the boat would not be allowed to launch in the lake for the remainder of the season.

Parks Canada found a loose clump of zebra mussels in Boat Cove, but this doesn’t mean an established colony of zebra mussels exists there, Cooper said.

“The options are going to depend on how established they are. So our next step is around monitoring and trying to determine if they’re established in the lake.”

One member of the public who showed up to Tuesday night’s event said he was disappointed with how long test results for zebra mussel eDNA in Clear Lake have taken.

Another person asked Parks Canada staff if they’ve ever made contingency plans on what to do if zebra mussels are active in Clear Lake, since they’ve been testing for their presence since 2013.

“What we’ve found is eDNA in one spot of the lake, and most of that spot freezes to the lake bed in the winter. Zebra mussels will not survive that. We get about four feet of ice,” said Borden Smid, resource conservation manager with Parks Canada.

The use of potash is the only approved treatment for zebra mussels in lakes in Canada, Smid said, and has been used in harbours in Lake Winnipeg.

“But we need to find something before we can do it,” he added. Parks Canada staff will be monitoring Boat Cove in a grid pattern, prioritizing certain areas of the lake where they think zebra mussels will be present. “Then we can decide if there’s something we can do.”

Another potential treatment option, Cooper said, is covering part of the lake where zebra mussels might be found.

“There are a number of things that we can and will do, but it will depend on what we find,” she said.

Parks Canada wouldn’t consider treating the whole lake, Smid said, because it would be too expensive.

One of the challenges that could be facing Clear Lake, said RMNP external relations manager Dameon Wall, is that zebra mussels become very prolific once they start to breed. Smid said the zebra mussel clump picked up in Clear Lake were of the age to reproduce.

“We don’t know where that clump came from,” Cooper said. “They may have been introduced. Someone may have put them there. We don’t know. And until we find more evidence, we may never know.”

To be classified as an established population in Clear Lake, zebra mussels must be attached to a hard surface in the lake that is permanent and immovable, Cooper said.

One of the attendees said that the only way to prevent zebra mussels in the lake is to use their watercraft in only one body of water but said that it doesn’t seem like everyone is ready to accept that.

All possibilities are on the table for what watercraft and other items might or might not be allowed in Clear Lake in the upcoming boating season, Cooper said.

“We will be making that decision on the best possible science,” she said.

Parks Canada will be following up with Manitoba Hydro and the province to tackle the issue of zebra mussels in Clear Lake going forward. Parks Canada has held discussions with the province that have been very positive and collaborative, Cooper said.

“We are quite aligned on how we would like to see this roll out.”

The Sun contacted the provincial government to request an interview with Economic Development, Investment, Trade and Natural Resources Minister Jamie Moses, but was not granted one. Instead, Moses’ press secretary, Caedmon Malowany, stated in an email that Moses reached out to the federal government the moment he got confirmation of zebra mussels in Clear Lake.

“Scheduling the meeting has been challenging for both Minister Moses and Minister [Steven] Guilbeault, but we are confident that those meetings will take place in the near future,” Malowany said.

In the meantime, the email continued, Terry Duguid, the prime minister’s parliamentary secretary and special envoy on freshwater, is scheduled to speak with Moses before Christmas.

Parks Canada staff encouraged attendees to fill out comment cards and sign up for email information updates about zebra mussels and other aquatic invasive species in Clear Lake.

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