This month Alabama Power – with the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (ADCNR) and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) – conducted studies observing the response of two federally listed snail species during drops in habitat water levels.

The four-day effort – manned largely by Alabama Power Environmental Affairs employees under the guidance of ADCNR and USFWS – surveyed populations of the tulotoma snail (Tulotoma magnifica) and rough horn snail (Pleurocera foremani) along the waterline as water levels dropped a foot a day on Alabama Power’s Lay Lake. Using the final day as a control, biologists with the three groups hope to determine the two species’ ability to respond to water level fluctuations.

Working to create conditions to help these snails thrive, the three organizations have previously conducted population surveys for the two species. In 2012, Alabama Power, USFWS and ADCNR surveyed rough horn snail populations along the Yellowleaf Creek tributary of Lay Lake.

In 2009, the three groups, along with Auburn University researchers, conducted similar surveys on clusters of the then-endangered tulotoma snail on Lay Lake and below Jordan Dam near Wetumpka. Those surveys helped lead to the first down-listing of an endangered mollusk in North America, when the snail was reclassified as threatened at the request of ADCNR in 2011.

As part of relicensing its dams on the Coosa River with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), Alabama Power has worked with ADNCR and USFWS during the past decade to find ways to protect and improve habitat conditions for these and other aquatic species – providing best-management practices for shoreline development and management and installing equipment at the dams it operates to increase the oxygen level downstream.

Because of its FERC-licensed operations, Lay Lake rarely sees water fluctuations like those during a planned drawdown – which gives residents of the lake the rare opportunity to repair or construct permitted projects below the normal waterline. The last scheduled drawdown on Lay Lake occurred in 2005.

Results from this survey will allow regulators to determine the impact of drawdowns on these species, and, if minimal, provide lake residents a biennial drawdown as water conditions allow moving forward.