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News : What's Hot
Milfoil - The Perfect Nuisance: Bass Anglers Love It, Water Skiers Curse It, Minnesotans Fight Over How to Deal With It
July 27, 2010 -- One thing could be worse than swimming tangled in Eurasian watermilfoil: getting sucked into controversy surrounding the clingy weed that has invaded 235 of Minnesota's lakes and streams.
From Winona to the Iron Range, Minnesotans who love their lakes are frustrated — and, in many cases, fighting — over how to live with milfoil. Read the full story to get the details about how this aquatic weed is the perfect example of the complexity and the multiple values surrounding the invasive species issue.
"It provides a place for the little fishies to hide so they grow up to be big fishies," Schmidt said. "Its root system holds the bottom in place, which holds phosphorus in place too. ... It makes the water clearer, which is a sign of better water quality." Before you milfoil haters start frothing, you should know that Schmidt quickly added this: "Aesthetically it is smelly and ugly ... devastating in the shallow areas to surface recreation."
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The Stop Aquatic Hitchhikers web site is part of the ANS Task Force public
awareness campaign and is sponsored by the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
and the U.S. Coast Guard.
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