UPDATED: Hope is not enough to combat invasives

Opinion

“The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.”

— William Arthur Ward, American author

A few weeks ago, the Brandon Riverbank Discovery Centre advertised on its Facebook page that a provincial watercraft decontamination mobile station would be available for one weekend only — the last weekend of August.

“Prevent the spread of Zebra Mussels and other AIS (aquatic invasive species) by decontaminating before heading to other bodies of water and watersheds,” read the Aug. 28 post.

While we are glad that Brandon’s main river attraction took the initiative that one weekend in August to have boats checked before getting on the water, it’s a little concerning that the Riverbank did not endeavour to have the same mobile station available this weekend for Paddlefest.

The two-day event begins this evening with a paddle and marshmallow roast. Saturday features a gear swap and sale, demonstrations on land and on the water, and rides in a voyageur canoe with RiverSong Wilderness Outfitters. The whole event culminates with something called Brandon 100 — essentially an effort to attract as many boats on the river as possible by 7 p.m. to watch the sun set.

This is most certainly a wonderful event, as proven by last year’s inaugural success. And we would like to see such initiatives continue on our waterways. But the threat of invasive species in our rivers and lakes is a real one, and the organization’s — and the city’s — decision to leave it up to boaters to do the right thing is not the right one.

“People need to take responsibility,” Mayor Jeff Fawcett told the Sun this week. “One person can ruin things for everyone, but my hope is that everybody who is participating in Paddlefest is already engaged in community events and will follow best practices in order to get on the water.”

No offence, Mr. Mayor, but action is better than hope.

As many Manitobans are now aware, zebra mussels have become a growing problem for this province. They were detected in Lake Winnipeg in 2013 and had moved into the Nelson River by 2019. They have become an expensive nuisance for Manitoba Hydro, which has been seeing the mussels settling inside its equipment since 2021, even as the species continues its march west and north.

Last year, zebra mussels were confirmed in Riding Mountain National Park’s most famous waterway, Clear Lake, resulting in Parks Canada initially banning all boat traffic on the lake. This last year has been a public relations disaster for the park with a poorly timed and poorly reasoned decision to ban motorized boats from Clear Lake — after Parks Canada had stated that eradicating the invasive species was not feasible.

In the rest of the province, patchworks of concerned communities and municipalities have banded together in different regions to try to save their own local lake systems. But not all actions taken have been universally welcomed. For example, a decision by the RM of Prairie Lakes earlier this year to implement a “one waterbody watercraft” bylaw at Pelican Lake — one boat, one lake, essentially — raised the ire of area businesses that were concerned that the changes would drive visitors away during the summer tourism season.

We understand — efforts to prevent the spread of invasive species are both difficult and divisive. And it’s hard to get everyone on the same page.

For example, the RM of Killarney-Turtle Mountain, which borders about a third of one side of Pelican Lake, declined to participate in the access control program — even though it told CBC in May that it supports aquatic invasive species education and prevention.

Not far from Riding Mountain, however, a one-boat-one-lake initiative was implemented at Sandy Lake in the wake of the discovery of zebra mussels at Clear Lake last year. And this past June, we reported that the province introduced new rules for watercraft at Rivers Provincial Park, requiring the decontamination of boats before entering and before leaving Lake Wahtopanah at Rivers.

In light of the fact that zebra mussels were confirmed upstream in Clear Lake, and detected downstream in the Assiniboine River at the Brandon generating station, the government acted out of “an abundance of caution,” a provincial spokesperson said.

The zebra mussel larvae in Brandon were detected during Manitoba Hydro’s routine zebra mussel monitoring program, which confirmed its findings in a followup sampling. In June, the province announced there was no further evidence of zebra mussels in the Assiniboine River, with additional testing returning negative results.

But that’s not a good reason for complacency. Bringing a clean, drained and dried boat may be required under provincial regulations, as executive director Dean Hammond told the Sun this week, but there needs to be more effort in place to enforce the rules locally.

We know that Brandon cannot control the actions of boaters upstream or downstream of city limits, but what we can do is lead by example and take the threat from invasive species more seriously. Because not everyone is deserving of the city’s trust.

It may well be that the Riverbank’s dalliance with the mobile decontamination station was merely the start of an effort to bring a more permanent inspection system to this city. And if that’s the case, we would gladly support the idea — not only for the sake of our section of the winding Assiniboine River, but for all the communities downstream too.

Hope is not a strategy. And a strategy is what this city needs going forward.