While U.S. dithers, Canada acts on carp
Commentary
At least Canada’s got some cojones.
While U.S. efforts to control highly destructive Asian carp continue to be mired in a sea of bureaucracy, the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources announced March 4 that a record $50,000 fine had just been issued to Feng Yang, 52, the owner of a fish-importing company caught trying to smuggle 4,000 pounds of live bighead and grass carp into Canada last fall.
Four days later, on March 8, the ministry announced a $20,000 fine against Sweetwater Springs Fish Farm of Peru, Ind., for smuggling 6,000 pounds of live bighead carp into Canada last month.
Both defendants pleaded guilty to one count of possessing live invasive fish at separate court hearings, admitting they had violated a section of Canada’s federal Fisheries Act which has prohibited the possession of live bighead, grass, black, or silver carp since 2005.
The citations came following raids by the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and the Canada Border Services Agency. In Yang’s case, a truck with Asian carp was pulled over in Windsor after entering Canada from Detroit via the Ambassador Bridge on Nov. 4. Sweetwater Springs Fish Farm had a vehicle with Asian carp stopped in Port Edward, Ont., on Feb. 18 after it had entered Canada via the Blue Water Bridge, the ministry said.
Ministry spokesman John Cooper said he hopes the fines help spread the word “that it is not worth it 
trying to bring live Asian carp into Ontario.”
Yang apparently didn’t get the point the first time around. According to the Windsor Star, he was fined $40,000 in 2006 for possessing the same invasive species.
Both times, the fish were likely headed to Asian markets in the Toronto area, where they are a popular ethnic delicacy, the newspaper reported. It also quoted an Ontario Commercial Fisheries’ Association biologist as saying the carp are typically purchased in pairs as an ethnic ritual that involves killing one and setting the the other free.
Won’t solve problem, but beats U.S. hand-wringing
Canada, of course, probably hasn’t solved its share of the Asian carp crisis by swooping in with these big fines.
But it’s a start. Canada’s at least trying to move swiftly and make a point, unlike the pathetic hand-wringing and bureaucratic back-slapping that’s been occurring in the United States.
Where do you start when analyzing the U.S. response? The Asian carp story continues to be one of the most insane foul-ups in our federal government’s fishery program.
How does the government explain the 17 years of inaction as the bighead and silver carp migrated north against the current of one of North America’s mightiest streams, the Mississippi River?
It can’t.
OK, so what’s done is done. Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it, which – unfortunately – is what’s happening.
This month’s big news, if you can call it that, is new legislation out in Washington aimed at getting the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to do its job and protect us from a pending disaster, which is no small feat.
Avoiding a biological Katrina
Remember how New Orleans tried convincing the Corps it needed stronger levees for the city’s Third Ward before Hurricane Katrina hit? ‘Nuff said.
The legislation is focused on a Corps report known as the Great Lakes and Mississippi River Interbasin Study, or GLMRIS, which is reputedly costing taxpayers $25 million.
The Corps started it last year and has given itself until at least 2015 to finish it. The Corps is to come up with the ultimate plan to keep Asian carp out of the lakes now that the fish have breached a series of electrical barriers 20 miles southwest of Chicago that were supposed to keep them out.
Don’t be surprised if a multi-billion dollar fix is proposed, whether that means a hydrological separation of the Mississippi from Lake Michigan or some other massive engineering feat that would go down in history as one of the Great Lakes region’s largest.
That, of course, means trying to squeeze big money out of Washington and the cash-strapped Great Lakes states, which means even more delays and political maneuvering.
Some 20 areas around the lakes are to be examined. One activist group, Freshwater Future, claimed some $15 million of the study is to be spent on evaluating the Chicago area alone.
First, as if we need this crisis muddied by more government jargon, planning studies, abbreviations and acronyms…
Second – and I know I’ll be accused of being overly provincial with this – but where was Toledo in the recently concluded public hearing process? Or Monroe, Port Clinton or Sandusky?
How about attention at Ground Zero?
Sorry to break this news to the Corps, but of the two closest cities from where public comment was being elicited – Ann Arbor and Cleveland – the former is not a Great Lakes port and the latter is better known for rockin’ ‘n’ rollin’ than fishing.
I’ve said it before and will say it again: Western Lake Erie is Ground Zero for the Asian carp crisis.
The story may be developing in Chicago, in rural Indiana and even in Ontario.
But western Lake Erie has more at stake than any other place.
It is the anchor spot of the Great Lakes region’s $7 billion fishery.
More fish are caught in Lake Erie than the other four lakes combined. Most of those are spawned in western Lake Erie and its tributaries, such as the Maumee and Sandusky Rivers.
I’ve got nothing against Ann Arbor and Cleveland. But for the Corps to bypass western Lake Erie is, well, just pretty darned convenient for the Corps.
The consensus of the Great Lakes congressional delegation is to get the Corps moving faster on the GLM-whatever-it’s-called and report its findings within 18 months.
Not a bad deal, if you consider from an ecological standpoint that such analysis really should have been done at least 18 YEARS ago.
The Ann Arbor-based Great Lakes Commission, which represents each of the Great Lakes states and provinces, and the Chicago-based Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative, which represents the region’s metropolitan areas, are paying to have a similar study done within a year.
“We are anxious to light a fire under the Army Corps of Engineers,” U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D., Mich.), one of the bill’s co-sponsors in the Senate, said.
Dave Wethington, Corps’ project manager, said the pace can’t be accelerated because of the study’s broad scope.
In addition to its $7 billion fishing industry, the Great Lakes are the backbone of the region’s $16 billion recreational boating industry and some 800,000 jobs.
“The stakes are just too high and require urgent action,” Tim Eder, Great Lakes Commission executive director, said.
U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D., Ohio) said Congress “can and should do more to ensure that this invasive species stays far away from the Great Lakes and Lake Erie.”
Editor’s note: Check out the invasive species action at Echo’s Great Lakes Smackdown: Terrestrial Terrors