71 favorable to both parties given the failure of the Soviet crops caused by harsh climate conditions and the surplus of American grain caused both by a string to strong growing years and the high value of the dollar making the grain less favorable.8 The further dissemination of the muscles can be attributed to much smaller scale human action. The muscles traveled quickly through waterways connected to the Great Lakes system, with records showing their first appearance in the Fox River just one year after the first record of them in the Great Lakes.9 By the beginning of the 2000s the mussels had become one of the largest populations of invasive species in the Northern region of the Midwest.10 However, their spread beyond the interconnected waterways was, and remains, substantially slower than expected. The most common way the mussels are moved from one isolated body of water to another is by independent fishermen transporting their boats. Given the quick spread across the Northern region, most of these fishermen are traveling from one body of water that has been invaded to another where Zebra Mussels are already present. Thus, slowing the spread to other regions and bodies of water.11 However, in recent years, there have been records of Zebra Mussels as far south as Louisiana and as far west as California. The Round Goby is much less widespread than Zebra Mussels, however they were likely introduced in the same way at approximately the same time. Like the mussels, Round Goby are native to Eurasia and can survive for a long time with few resources. This makes them prime candidates for transportation across the Atlantic in ballast water.12 Given that the first record is from 8 Bill Keller, “Reagan's Russian Grain Harvest,” The New York Times (The New York Times, September 9, 1984), https://www.nytimes.com/1984/09/09/business/reagan-s-russian-grain-harvest.html?pagewanted=1. 9 “Zebra Mussel (Dreissena Polymorpha) - Species Profile,” USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database, accessed November 13, 2022, https://nas.er.usgs.gov/queries/factsheet.aspx?speciesID=5. 10 JEFFREY L. RAM and ROBERT F. MCMAHON, “Introduction: The Biology, Ecology, and Physiology of Zebra Mussels,” American Zoologist 36, no. 3 (1996): pp. 239-243, https://doi.org/10.1093/icb/36.3.239. 11 Jonathan M. Bossenbroek et al., “Forecasting the Expansion of Zebra Mussels in the United States,” Conservation Biology 21, no. 3 (December 2007): pp. 800-810, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1523-1739.2006.00614.x. 12 Ibid.
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