Pandora's Locks: The Opening of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway

24/ SAVING PARADISE

349 349 VHS is the most important and dangerous fish virus known worldwide. Its discovery in our fresh water is disturbing and potentially catastrophic. —Jim Winton, chief of fish health, U.S. Geological Survey 24 SAVING PARADISE A thin layer of fog hovered above the surface of Lake Superior by the time I set out on a five-mile hike to the top of Greenstone Ridge, the basalt spine of Isle Royale National Park. The archipelago in northwest Lake Superior was one of the Great Lakes’ most serene places. Accessible only by boat or seaplane, Isle Royale offered visitors a true nature experience. There were no wheeled vehicles of any kind, no towns, barking dogs, or television. Electricity was only available at a couple of hotels that National Park Service concessionaires operated for those visitors unwilling to go without modern conveniences. Elusive wolves that preyed on moose ruled the island ecosystem. Native lake trout ruled the waters that enveloped the islands. At dawn and dusk, it was more common to hear the 350 C H A P T E R 2 4 350 haunting call of a loon than the voice of another human being. Solitude was the rule—not the exception. The trail to Greenstone Ridge snaked through dense stands of spruce, birch, and poplar devoid of man-made structures; across soggy marshes; and over babbling brooks shaded by a thick canopy. I hiked in the shade for a couple of miles before reaching the rocky incline that delivered me to Mount Franklin. The view from the top of the island, 1,074 feet above Superior’s cerulean water, was breathtaking. Looking to the north, beyond Pickerel Cove and Amygdaloid Island, my thoughts drifted from the rocky balcony to what lived in Superior’s depths. The 475 square miles of clean, cold water within the boundaries of Isle Royale National Park supported 12 species of lake trout, including the rare coaster brook trout. Superior’s lake trout fishery was the only one to fully recover from the carnage sea lamprey inflicted on Great Lakes native fish in the mid-1900s. The largest of the Great Lakes was widely considered the healthiest of North America’s five freshwater seas at the dawn of the twenty-first century. The question was whether Superior could hold onto that distinction in the face of increasing threats from new invasive species. As I soaked up the lake’s resplendent beauty during my 2005 visit to Isle Royale, scientists 400 miles away were unraveling an ecological nightmare that would put the park’s treasured lake trout fishery at great risk. Efforts to protect the fishery would thrust Isle Royale’s park superintendent into the raging debate over how best to prevent a deadly fish virus from infesting Lake Superior. Spring 2005 began like so many before it in the villages that lined Lake Ontario’s sprawling Bay of Quinte. Anglers stored ice-fishing huts and put boats back in the water as the lake released its icy grip. For many in the region known as Quinte Country, the warm months were spent fishing, sailing, and canoeing the huge, sheltered bay on Lake Ontario’s north shore. But that year would be different. Overnight, portions of the tranquil bay were transformed into mass graves for dead fish. A massive fish kill blanketed parts of the lake with freshwater drum. Tons of dead fish were pulled from the lake—countless more sank to the bottom. A large fish die-off was always a ghastly site. But the fish kill that year was unlike anything residents of the area, or scientists, had ever observed. 351 S A V I N G PA R A D I S E 351 The dead drum, which normally ranged in color from light gray to pale bronze, had red marks along the edges of their scales. Blood was pooled in their bulging eyes and around the gills. Some had large red spots on their sides. The fish appeared to have bled to death. In a way, they had. Scientists at the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources determined that the fish had died from viral hemorrhagic septicemia, or VHS, one of the world’s deadliest and most feared fish viruses.1 The Bay of Quinte fish kill was the first confirmed case of VHS in the Great Lakes. Many more would follow. The following year, VHS killed hundreds of...