What in the world is growing on my dock?

The water quality office phone rang last week and Gopala Borchelt, Executive Director of Table Rock Lake Water Quality answered. A local lake resident wanted to know what in the world was growing on their dock and could it be the result of some lake contamination or sewer overflow. Maybe a space alien! Since the dock was nearby, Gopala jumped in the car with camera in hand to see what was up. It turns out the strange blob is not the result of any pollution or invasion but a strange creature that is actually working to help us keep the lake clean.

The blob is a bryozoan colony.  Pectinatella magnifica is a member of the animal phylum Ectoprocta (common names: bryozoans, moss animals), a group with a fossil record extending back to the upper Cambrian (500,000,000 years ago!). The majority of bryozoans are marine (several thousand species), but one class, the Phylactolaemata, is found exclusively in fresh water. The species of this class is what is found in our area lakes. The basic ground plan of a bryozoan superficially appears to have more in common with a coral; they are, in fact, ecological analogs. Bryozoans and corals are in different phyla and are unrelated. What seems to be an individual is actually a colony of zooids (not polyps as in corals). Each zooid has whorls of delicate feeding tentacles swaying slowly in the water catching food.

Bryozoan scraped off into a dip net.

Though they are not closely related to corals, bryozoans are superficially similar in that they are tiny colonial aquatic creatures that effectively filter particles from the water. The large gelatinous species is native to North America and often grows on docks and other submerged wood. During the summer it releases small larvae that swim away and establish new colonies nearby. In the fall each colony produces thousands of tiny, seed-like disks that remain dormant over winter and germinate the following spring. Most other freshwater bryozoan species form branching tubules that resemble brown moss in the water (Bryozoa = "moss animal"). While freshwater bryozoans improve water quality, some species become a serious nuisance when they clog intake and irrigation pipes. I, for one, am glad for the help the bryozoans are providing in keeping the lakes clean!

Holding a bryozoan (gloves help - it is slimy!).

Quote of the Week

Ocean: A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man - who has no gills. -Ambrose Bierce

Current News Articles

CSI: Wildlife - Solving Mysterious Animal Deaths

June 20, 2011

Carol Meteyer solves cases of mysterious wildlife death using advanced forensic skills to help prosecute people who kill animals in violation of federal law.

Carol Meteyer unfurled the Sandhill crane's gray wings across the steel examination table, and for a moment, the 4-foot-tall bird regained its former majesty. In that instant, the laboratory's windowless cinderblock walls, cement floor and fluorescent lights disappeared. It was easy to imagine the crane's wings cupping the prairie air as it landed in an Oklahoma field, its long gray neck stretched, its red crown the only bright spot in a dun landscape.

To read more, click HERE.

By RANDY KREHBIEL 

Tulsa World Staff Writer 

Published: 7/2/2011  2:27 AM

The four Grand River Dam Authority directors who were able to make Friday's emergency board meeting in Tulsa took no official action concerning an outbreak of a potentially toxic bacteria, choosing instead to adopt a "swim at your own risk" policy. 
Warnings will be posted around the lake, said acting Chief Executive Officer Michael Kiefner, and people found in the water this weekend by the GRDA police, who patrol the lake, will be advised of the dangers but not forced to get out. 

To read more, click HERE.

"Sustainable Communities, Healthy Watersheds" 

2010 Annual Report Available Online

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Office of Wetlands, Oceans and Watersheds (OWOW) has released its 2010 Annual Report titled "Sustainable Communities, Healthy Watersheds." Sustainable Communities and Healthy Watersheds are two major themes for EPA's national water program

The report contains information about EPA's work with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in the development of new draft guidance on Identifying Waters Protected by the Clean Water Act (also known as the Waters of the U.S. Draft Guidance), progress in better protection of water quality in Appalachia from the harmful effects of surface coal mining operations, and advancement in the work of the National Ocean Council.  The report also includes information about OWOW's response to the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill through data monitoring evaluation, design monitoring plans and other efforts. Information about efforts to address nitrogen and phosphorus pollution through the development of a recommended Framework for states  as well as a new guidance that addresses polluted runoff from federal land management activity in the Chesapeake Bay watershed are also included in this publication

The report can be viewed at: http://water.epa.gov/aboutow/owow/upload/owowannualreport2010.pdf

(Editor's note: The above link appears not to be working today, but had been working in the past. Hopefully it is a temporary problem.)

For information about the Office of Wetlands, Oceans and Watersheds: http://water.epa.gov/aboutow/owow/