There’s a lot to unpack from Saturday’s Chautauqua Lake Symposium.

The county-backed event brought a packed house to the Chautauqua Harbor Hotel to hear from DEC officials, the Army Corps of Engineers, groups studying conditions on Chautauqua Lake and politicians representing the area in Albany and Washington, D.C.

For all the good things that were discussed Saturday, however, one growing issue stands out.

Starry stonewort continues to expand its presence in the lake. Dr. Rob Richardson of North Carolina State University’s Aquatic Plant Management Program noted what was once a somewhat localized area of starry stonewort in Chautauqua Lake is now found

“The bad news is you can find it in the north basin and south basin,” Richardson said. “There’s not a geographical isolation of starry stonewort. It’s throughout the entire lake system.”

Starry stonewort is an invasive species that is a bushy, bright green, macro-algae. It produces a characteristic star-shaped bulbil. Areas affected on freshwater lakes and ponds in which the aquatic sub-species invade include dense mats at the water’s surface inhibit waterways and clog boat propellers; overtakes habitat and outcompetes native aquatic plants, potentially lowering diversity; provides unsuitable shelter, food, and nesting habitat for native fish and wildlife.

So far herbicides have proven ineffective in dealing with starry stonewort. North Harmony officials have teamed with the Chautauqua Lake and Watershed Management Alliance on a process known as diver assisted suction harvesting (DASH) in which a diver operating a vacuum hose under the water selectively collects and removes the invasive species from the lake. The hose is connected to a support boat, where the material is bagged and then transported to shore for proper disposal.

Some lake associations, such as the Koronis Lake Association in Minnesota, have had luck with a mix of chemical treatment and mechanical harvesting in keeping starry stonewort below “nuisance levels” though improper mechanical harvesting can actually speed starry stonewort’s spread in lakes where starry stonewort is in its early stages of development.

In short, for all of our debate and discussion over curly leaf pondweed and milfoil, starry stonewort is likely to dominate lake management discussions in the future if it continues its spread throughout Chautauqua Lake – and there are far fewer reliable options to deal with this new invasive than the ones we’re so used to dealing with.