News flash: pesticides are never applied in a vacuum.

Most recently, the minty-sounding, methoprene-based larvicide Altosid, commonly added to waterways to squelch mosquito larvae, has been accused of causing decreased lobster harvests along the eastern coast of the U.S.

Lobsters and mosquitos? We’re probably all familiar with the weird, bobbleheaded mosquito larvae - seen them squirming around in puddles and old rainwater filled buckets. But lobsters (and crabs, and oysters, and clams, and mussels) also have a nearly microscopic larval stage. For up to several months, shellfish and mollusk larvae become members of the massive swirling planktonic community before fattening up, developing shells, and settling on the ocean floor.

Unsurprisingly, lobstermen in Rhode Island who are seeing widespread shell disease and reduced hatch rates are blaming the state’s use of Altosid for indiscriminate larvicide. And although there are no scientific studies to back them yet, the lobstermen may have a case – Maine has banned methoprene-containing substances, and their lobsters are free of the shell disease and low birth rates plaguing other states.

Should these “side effects” of pesticides ever really be unexpected? When will pesticides cease to be evaluated in laboratory vacuums, and instead be studied in ways that acknowledge their potential influences on the ecosystems to which they are applied – before they’re actually applied?

Via The Jamestown Press, Photo from The Secret Life of Lobsters

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