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Tahoe bugs are "canaries in the coal mine"

You are probably familiar with the "Keep Tahoe Blue" stickers, which have brought public awareness to the decline in clarity of Lake Tahoe's signature blue waters. 

But here's a bumper sticker you haven't seen, yet: 'Save Tahoe's Smallest Critters.' Those invertebrates, some only native to Tahoe, are undergoing a massive extinction at the lake's bottom. A group of divers recently completed a first-of-its-kind tour of the entire lake in order to assess the ecological changes there. 

Sudeep Chandra is a limnologist at the University of Nevada, Reno, and his team will be studying what those divers found. He spoke with KUNR's Will Stone on Morning Edition.

Will Stone is a former reporter at KUNR Public Radio.