The black and red circles on the sides of thousands of Lake Erie fish are open wounds. Invasive sea lampreys latch on with suction-cup mouths and razor-sharp teeth and literally suck the life out of their hosts.
As part of a broad Great Lakes program to reduce sea lamprey populations, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, with assistance from Pennsylvania Fish and Boat, will apply the commonly used lampricide TFM to stretches of Erie County’s Crooked Creek where the parasites spawn. Neither the lampreys nor the lampricide pose a threat to humans. The project is tentatively scheduled for Oct. 20.
Sea lampreys are believed to have entered the St. Lawrence Seaway in the ballast of ocean-going ships as long ago as the 1830s. They reproduce throughout the Great Lakes, spawning in tributaries with sandy, cobbled substrate with some organic matter. In Pennsylvania’s Lake Erie tributaries, that’s mostly Crooked, Raccoon and Conneaut creeks.
Walleye, yellow perch and whitefish are susceptible and steelhead and browns are preferred targets, but the eel-like fish has taken a serious bite out of Lake Erie’s struggling lake trout. Six of every seven fish attacked by a sea lamprey dies. An aggressive predator, it kills about 40 pounds of fish in a lifetime. Collectively they’re believed to have killed more than 100 million pounds of fish in the Great Lakes.
But the trend is turning. Fish and Boat biologist Chuck Murray said Lake Erie’s sea lamprey population peaked in 2009, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s “vigilant” lampricide program has the unwanted species on the run.
First Published: October 9, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
