Wednesday July 8, 2026
PBS Abridged —
To the casual observer, the waterway that enters the Port of West Sacramento looks no different than it ever has.
But beneath the placid surface, a new front in a slow-burning environmental emergency has opened.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife announced last week that golden mussels were discovered in the Sacramento River Deep Water Ship Channel and Washington Lake in West Sacramento.
In addition to clogging up infrastructure, the fast-spreading, invasive species can outcompete native species and cause harmful algal blooms.
“It does impact our native fish and wildlife,” department spokesperson Krysten Kellum said.
The small, hardy bivalve native to Asia was first detected in California in 2024 and proliferated in central and southern parts of the state. Until now, it had not made it farther north than the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Preventing spread
Once golden mussels are established, they are extremely difficult to get rid of.
Kellum said that in other parts of the state, officials have tried to control the outbreak with things like hot water treatments and manually scraping docks. Even if those efforts work in the short term, they don’t permanently remove the mussels.
“They come back,” Kellum said.
So far, the only real option has been trying to slow down the pest’s spread by making boaters and recreators aware of the risk.