We’re getting a bit salty in this episode… listen up! Salt helps keep winter roads safe. But when snow melts, the salt runs off pavement and can end up in waterways. John Jackson is with the Stroud Water Research Center in Pennsylvania. In the lab, he’s studied the toxicity of salt on mayflies – a …

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—Brooke Kansier, Great Lakes Echo* It might not be as addictive as Candy Crush, but a new EPA app could have big implications for water management and the people who drink, swim or fish within the Great Lakes. The yet-unnamed app will detect blooms of cyanobacteria—a photosynthetic microbe often mistaken for algae and responsible for …

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Public and private groups have treated mine drainage and cleared up the water of the Kiski-Conemaugh. Listen up: Reckner: “When I was a little girl, I grew up along the banks of the river, and we used to go splash around in the water….and when we would come out, our clothes would be stained orange…” …

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Blood-sucking vampire fish aren’t native to the Great Lakes, and yet…they’re heeeere! Listen up: Sea lampreys, like many a scary-movie villain, attach themselves to other creatures and suck their blood and other body fluids. But instead of showing up on the silver screen, this invasive species is all over the Great Lakes. Discovered in the …

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Get the dirt on tiny, invasive mudsnails . . . learn more:   New Zealand mudsnails have now been found twice in Wisconsin – most recently in Badger Mill Creek, near Madison. They’re the size of a corn kernel, but they can outcompete native species. In extreme cases… “We’ve seen densities of over 500,000 mud …

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