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Mussel threat turns real during training session

Mussel threat turns real during training session | iNFOnews.ca
A conservation officer examines a boat for mussels. Okanagan Basin Water Board

OKANAGAN – A training session on how to inspect for invasive mussels turned hands-on when a contaminated boat showed up from Ontario.

An Ontario couple shipped the boat to the Lower Mainland after it was moored for several months in the mussel-infested Rideau Canal, according to a press release from the Okanagan Basin Water Board.

The boat was inspected for mussels before it left Ontario but was stopped in Alberta and decontaminated before carrying on to the Okanagan, spokeswoman Corrine Jackson says. Authorities in Alberta phoned ahead and the boat was ordered to Kelowna on Monday for follow-up inspection.

It took the B.C inspectors just minutes to find several mussels the size of a grain of sand on various parts of the boat, which was then moved to a gravelled location for full decontamination.

This is the just the latest in a string of incidents this summer where suspected high risk boats have been stopped and decontaminated in B.C.

The water board has been lobbying federal and provincial governments to beef up mussel inspection and control in a bid to ward off contamination by the invasive species.

Mussel threat turns real during training session | iNFOnews.ca
A mussel the size of a grain of sound found on a boat bound for Okanagan Lake. Okanagan Basin Water Board

To contact the reporter for this story, email John McDonald at jmcdonald@infonews.ca or call 250-808-0143. To contact the editor, email mjones@infonews.ca or call 250-718-2724.

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John McDonald

John began life as a journalist through the Other Press, the independent student newspaper for Douglas College in New Westminster. The fluid nature of student journalism meant he was soon running the place, learning on the fly how to publish a newspaper.

It wasn’t until he moved to Kelowna he broke into the mainstream media, working for Okanagan Sunday, then the Kelowna Daily Courier and Okanagan Saturday doing news graphics and page layout. He carried on with the Kelowna Capital News, covering health and education while also working on special projects, including the design and launch of a mass market daily newspaper. After 12 years there, John rejoined the Kelowna Daily Courier as editor of the Westside Weekly, directing news coverage as the Westside became West Kelowna.

But digital media beckoned and John joined Kelowna.com as assistant editor and reporter, riding the start-up as it at first soared then went down in flames. Now John is turning dirt as city hall reporter for iNFOnews.ca where he brings his long experience to bear on the civic issues of the day.

If you have a story you think people should know about, email John at jmcdonald@infonews.ca

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