The arrival of the foreign fresh water quagga mussel is helping tp improve the clarity of Dutch water, the Noord Hollands Dagblad reports on Wednesday.

The mussel has been living in Amsterdam’s canals, the Sloterplas waterways and the Vecht region since 2004 where it has been instrumental in removing algae and other particles from the water, the paper says.

A single mussel can filter a litre of water a day and experts have noticed the improvement in areas where the mussels are found, the paper said.

The mussel originates in the Russian Dnjepr river delta and it is unclear how it came to the Netherlands. One option is that it moved through the Danube-Rhine canal which connects east and western Europe.