Want some good cold-weather reading? Ohio State’s Ohio Sea Grant program offers a 160-page PDF e-book called Ohio Field Guide to Aquatic Invasive Species, with color photos for identifying aquatic invasive species and tips for preventing their introduction and spread. Featured are fish, plants, algae, mussels, crustaceans and others, including bighead carp, silver carp, didymo (an alga also called “rock snot”), fishhook waterflea, red swamp crayfish and Eurasian watermilfoil, to name just a few.
Ohio Sea Grant Specialist Tory Gabriel and Eugene Braig, CFAES aquatic ecosystems program director, helped produce the guide, whose introduction says, “Identifying and preventing the introduction and spread of aquatic invasive species are the keys to averting long-term ecosystem damage and ensuring the highest probability of effective control.”