Glacier Park, Blackfeet put boating ban in place

Glacier National Park and the Blackfeet Tribe announced in the past week that they would close all of their waters to boating, including both motorized and non-motorized craft.

The closure comes after water samples from Tiber Reservoir east of Shelby tested positive for the larvae of aquatic invasive mussels, with similar tests from Canyon Ferry Reservoir near Helena showing “suspect” or inconclusive results, according to officials at Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks.

Subsequent tests by three teams of mussel-sniffing dogs also had hits near a dock in the Tiber Reservoir, but adults weren’t immediately found.

The Park’s aquatic invasive plan of 2014 calls for an immediate closure when invasive mussels are detected within a waterway in the state of Montana. They closed their waters on Thursday. The Blackfeet, in turn, closed its waters on Monday.

The Park will begin an assessment period to conduct testing, inspect park boats, and evaluate the risk boats pose to park waters and waters downstream from the unintended introduction of invasive mussels. The assessment will likely include the evaluation of further tests of waters across the state during the summer of 2017, the Park said Thursday.

The closure will remain in place during the assessment period, which will extend until the nature of the threat is better understood. There is no set timeline at this point, said Park spokeswoman Lauren Alley, as the Park Service works with state agencies to collect data on the threat, though the closure will likely extend for months.

The Flathead Basin Commission was set to meet Wednesday to discuss the problem further.

The state has not closed Tiber to boats, noting the transmission possibility in cold water is minimal, said Eileen Ryce, FWP’s aquatic invasive species coordinator. Mussels don’t reproduce in water that’s colder than 50 degrees.

The next step is to bring in divers to search Tiber and Canyon Ferry for mussels. That could happen either this week, or next. But the positive test by the dogs is a high indication that Tiber is contaminated, Ryce conceded.

“Park scientists will work diligently with the state of Montana and other water quality experts to understand the scope of this threat, and identify steps the park will take to further protect our waters in the Crown of the Continent,” said park superintendent Jeff Mow in a release on Thursday.

“Until the Blackfeet ascertain which, if any, of its waters have been impacted, this precautionary step will ensure that unimpaired waters retain their current mussel-free status,” Dona Rutherford, director of the Blackfeet Fish and Wildlife Department said.

The Blackfeet had a mandatory check station on U.S. Highway 2 all summer. The state also had check stations on major highways near Tiber. But check stations aren’t manned 24 hours a day.

Few people boat in the Park in the wintertime. Glacier biologists test its waterways for invasive mussels in the first couple of weeks of August, when the water is warmest.

Glacier and the Backfeet require that all boats entering the Park or tribal waters be tested before entering the water. Last year, no boats tested positive for mussels through the Park’s testing program, Alley noted, though some were intercepted at a check station near Browning and the west side of Flathead Lake.

Tiber is only about an hour away from the Blackfeet Reservation.

In the North Fork of the Flathead, where the park boundary splits the waterway in half, there will not be a closure on the river, Alley said.

The mussels, once established, feed on the same algae that small fish do. They filter the water and can literally take over the ecosystem.

The closure does not include wading fishermen. People caught boating in the Park could face misdemeanor charges, which carry fines up to $5,000 and six months in jail.

Caryn Miske, the executive director of the Flathead Basin Commission, said the agency would be seeking funding to do more testing in the Flathead’s waters, particularly Flathead Lake. While testing is done on an annual basis, the number of tests is limited. Miske said with Flathead Lake’s size, it needs hundreds of testing points.

She supported the Park’s closure.

“I commend the Park for the closure,” she said. “It was the prudent thing to do to protect the resources of the Park.”

Once a body of water is infected, it’s nearly impossible to kill the mussels.

Tiber is 15,000 acres and has 149 miles of shoreline. Canyon Ferry is 33,500 acres and has 96 miles of shoreline. But being reservoirs, they could be drained. Draw down could kill the mussels. Ryce said that is a topic of discussion.