(Spirit Lake)– Officials overseeing the treatment of Eurasian watermilfoil on several of the Iowa Great Lakes say they’re encouraged with the results they’ve been seeing so far. Kim Bogenschutz, Aquatic Invasive Species Coordinator for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources says the conditions to apply the herbicide have been ideal this fall…
“So far the plan is working well, and all of the factors that we need, lack of rain, water not coming in from Spirit Lake, things like that, are working in our favor. We won’t know for sure until Spring, but so far things look good.”
Bogenschutz says crews will continue to monitor the situation throughout the winter…
“When the ice comes on we’ll be testing the water as well to see if the herbicide concentration is staying where we want it to be, and then ice up we have vegetation crews out of Clear Lake and then here out of Boone and of course the staff up there at Spirit Lake will be watching and monitoring and seeing if we got it. Hopefully it’s not in West Okoboji or Spirit Lake. We didn’t find it in there, we’re hoping it’s not in there because they’re higher up in the chain and it could spread from there, because it’s just a fragment. We just need to have people be real vigilant about even when they’re boating around making sure that they’re not trailering, or cutting pieces off, having them sticking to the boat, moving from one lake to the other.”
Eurasian watermilfoil was discovered for the first time late this past summer on several of the lower chain of lakes in the Iowa Great Lakes system.
