A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service assessment crew will conduct work in the Pine River in Mackinac County Tuesday, August 19, through Tuesday, August 26, to estimate the abundance of sea lampreys. The information gathered will be used to determine the need for sea lamprey control.

A first step in the control of sea lampreys is to survey streams tributary to the Great Lakes to determine the presence of lamprey larvae. Sea lampreys invaded the Great Lakes during the 1920s and have been a permanent, destructive element of the fishery ever since. Sea lampreys attach to fish with a suction cup mouth, rasp a hole though the fish's scales and skin, and feed on blood and body fluids. The average sea lamprey will destroy up to 40 pounds of fish during its parasitic phase.

Fishery biologists and technicians conduct surveys for sea lamprey larvae in hundreds of Great Lakes streams each year. Most surveys are conducted by electrofishing, but in deep waters crews use a lampricide approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Health Canada Pest Management Regulatory Agency. This lampricide is specially formulated onto sand granules and covered with a time-release coating. The formulation is sprayed over a measured surface area of water, where it sinks to the bottom, rapidly dissolves, and causes the larval sea lampreys to leave their burrows and swim to the surface, where they are collected.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Health Canada Pest Management Regulatory Agency have concluded that the lampricide poses no unreasonable risk to the general population and the environment when applied at concentrations necessary to detect larval sea lampreys. Applications are conducted in accordance with state permits.

Information about sea lampreys and sea lamprey control is available online at www.glfc.org.