Is the Asian Carp Invasion of the Great Lakes Underway?
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Asian Carp destroy ecosystems by gorging themselves on plankton and other fish, thus starving out other species.
Federal officials have found a second Asian carp beyond the electronic barriers at the mouth of the Chicago River and only six miles from Lake Michigan.
The carp can grow into 4-foot-long, 100-pound monsters that devour 40 percent of their body weight daily. They destroy ecosystems by gorging themselves on plankton and other fish, thus starving out other species.
A 20-pound bighead carp was caught by a fisherman in Illinois's Lake Calumet, on the South Side of Chicago, according to Associated Press reports.
The Asian Carp Regional Coordinating Committee (RCC), which announced the discovery of the carp, will conduct more sampling, and then proceed with netting and electro-fishing in the next several weeks, with the goal of reducing the number of Asian carp inside the electric barriers.
The 34.6-inch long, 19.6-pound Bighead carp was discovered about six miles between Lake Michigan and the T.J. O'Brien Lock and Dam, during regular samplings taken by an Illinois Department of Natural Resources (IDNR)-contracted commercial fisherman.
The IDNR and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have been doing intensive sampling of the Chicago Area Waterway System since Feb. 17.
Silver and Bighead Asian carp are the two most aggressive types of Asian carp, and thus cause the most concern. A common weight for either of them is 60 pounds, and they can grow to the 100 pound range. The carp consume up to half of their body weight every day. If they established sustainable populations in the Great Lakes, they could devastate these ecosystems.
Asian carp in the Mississippi and Illinois rivers have physically injured boaters by leaping four feet out of the water when disturbed, hitting boaters, and in some cases knocking them out of their vessels.
"We commend the IDNR for their ongoing vigilance in catching this fish, and identifying evidence that the Asian carp has now been above the barrier. The Great Lakes Boating Federation advises the less-frequent use of the Chicago-area locks," says Ned Dikmen, chairman of the Great Lakes Boating Federation.
For several decades, the carp have been swimming up the Mississippi, and into the Illinois rivers and canals that form an artificial link between the Mississippi Basin and the Great Lakes.
The Army Corps of Engineers is studying alternatives to the current electric barriers, but it says it will take years to complete the analysis. Meanwhile others like Joel Brammeier, president of the Alliance for the Great Lakes, is demanding that the connections between the river systems and the Great Lakes be closed permanently.
Read more: http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/06/24/carp-pocalypse-the-great-lakes-asian-carp-invasion-begins/?xid=aol-direct#ixzz0s4gAKMyH ###
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