Drain and dry your boats, folks. I was fishing a pile on Ray Roberts a couple weeks ago and got hung up. When I used "Ol' Sparky" to help retrieve my jig, I pulled up a branch of the brush too that had over 10 Zebra Mussels on it. It was crazy as I've never seen them before. I mumbled to myself that these things are going to be everywhere eventually, if they're not already......

http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/newsmedia/releases/?req=20130926a

Wow. Totally surprised to hear that they are in Lake Belton.

Yeah, I was surprised at that too. That's pretty far south!

Birds fly south....

Dosnt really suprise me much. They are probably already in most lakes in Texas. We only hear about the ones they have confimed to be found in.

Those critters are spreading like mesquite trees in Texas. A catfish fisherman told me that he has been finding Zebra Mussels in the bellies of catfish. If Crappie eat them, we might have to start using zebra muscle patterns on jigs.

WOW! That's crazy! I'm sure Lane and Robert could figure out a mold for those.

bad business. They are a nuance when they cover docks and piers. They are damaging when the clog water intake pipes. But the real problem may be that they eat the plankton that feed the shad that feed the crappie.

May be over reacting, there may be enough plankton for the shad and the mussels, just don't know yet.

David, I don't think birds spread ZM's!! Boaters do!! I am a little surprised the state doesn't do more to warn boaters of the threat of spreading the little ZM's.
At every boat ramp I've been to recently in OK, there are signs telling everyone how to prevent the spread. I just wish they had gone another step forward and installed wash stations for every boat coming out of the lake.
I'm sure it won't be long till every lake in both states
are infested just because of careless boaters.

I think these little devils are getting spread by multiple sources ....humans are probably the main culprit ....the pumping of water here and there surely speeds up the the infestation ...birds can probably spread them as well ....wake boats and the ballast they carry probably have the same effect as the pumping ....I doubt there is much that can be done at this point to stop the spread of them .....
we all know humans destroy pretty much everything in nature on a regular basis .....we as a species are killing our world one day at a time ...that's for sure

If they are 1" at full size and produce 1,000 eggs and can survive being out of the water for 7 days. Pretty sure they can be transported by just about any method.

maybe TPWD can stock the lakes with more crayfish and minnows ,..... minnows will eat fish poop and each other minnows , so they may not need plankton as much as shad.

great point Ketchin I wonder if the municicipalities that are pumping water from one lake to another will take some responsibility for the problem. Especially being the long term plan is to have all lakes connected to each other in one way or another. I don't think theres a way to stop the spread , we need to learn ways to deal with it.

Hydrilla is almost as bad. It is choking up the lakes everywhere. There are locations on Joe Pool that were good bank fishing locations five years ago that are worthless for anything today due to this weed.

It has also made it impossible to fish many locations using a boat and has made many slips at the marina unusable.

Of course Hydrilla is seasonal while the mussels are year around.

It is a shame that a species specific toxin can not be developed that targets just these two pests. They are doing it for the mosquitoes, would be nice if they do it for just these two pests as well.

Given all the commercial damage this mussel causes I am somewhat surprised a removal method has not been found for it by now.