3 States Compete for Water From Shrinking Lake Lanier

The demands of the little-known species has led Georgia officials to characterize the debate as a contest of "man versus mussel" -- suggesting that Georgians should get the water before mussels do.

But biologists said the demand for water in Apalachicola Bay is far broader than that.

The region's prized oyster harvest depends upon the freshwater infusion. Too much salinity allows oyster predators to attack. Moreover, the drought along the Apalachicola River has hurt the tupelo trees, from which the region's tupelo honey is named.

"This is not just people versus mussels," said Ted Hoehn, a state biologist who has worked around the bay for 20 years. "It's much bigger than that."

"Blaming the mussel is like blaming the canary in the coal mine for dying," said Andrew Smith, executive director of the Apalachicola Riverkeeper, an advocacy group.

Smith and others have been warning for years that the Atlanta region's rapid and unrestricted growth would put tremendous pressure on the region's resources and that a collapse of those resources is a natural disaster waiting to happen.

"This whole situation has been like Katrina in slow motion," said David Goldberg, a "smart growth" advocate and Atlanta-based writer on urban affairs. "It's the same confluence of factors. There's Mother Nature, the Army Corps of Engineers and the utter failure to plan for the growth of metro Atlanta."