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To guard Great Lakes, give fence a chance

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(VA) USA Today – It sounds like science fiction: an alien invasion of Lake Michigan by toddler-sized scum suckers. But around Chicago, the fear is so real that governments have already spent more than $11 million building electronic defenses to zap the invaders and trying to poison them. The alien is a fish, the Asian carp. The fear is that the voracious plant-eaters could migrate from the Mississippi River basin through a Chicago canal and into the Great Lakes, threatening the habitat of lake fish. The risk, however, is that a going-overboard solution (walling off the canal) will be adopted before the costly new defenses (electrical barriers) are given a chance to work.

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EPA to spend $13 million to help stop Asian carp

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(WI) Milwaukee Journal Sentinel – Less than two weeks after fishery experts spent about $3 million to poison the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal in a desperate attempt to beat back an Asian carp invasion of Lake Michigan, the federal government has announced it will throw another $13 million at the problem. That money will come from the recently passed $475 million Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and much of it will go to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers so the agency can build emergency berms and plug various waterways in the Chicago area to keep the carp from riding floodwaters into the lake. More

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Great Lakes need to be protected: Close the canal

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(MI) Detroit Free Press – The Great Lakes are the absolute crown jewels of Michigan and the Midwest (“Capitol Hill joins in carp assault,” Dec. 13). Michigan has by far more Great Lakes shoreline than any other state. We must protect the Great Lakes at all costs, for the sake of our environmental and economic futures. Our relatively clean, massive freshwater supply is the envy of the country, especially our brethren in the sun-parched Southwest.

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Man bites fish

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(IL) Chicago Tribune – When we learned that wildlife officials had spent $3 million poisoning the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal to kill one Asian carp (and tens of thousands of innocent by-swimmers), our first response was whew! The purpose of last weekend’s deliberate fish kill wasn’t to eradicate the carp population but to make sure none of them was close enough to make a run past an underwater electric barrier while it was shut down for maintenance. Despite the near-hysterical protests of some of our neighbors, the body count suggests the carp aren’t poised to take over Lake Michigan the day after tomorrow. Their numbers must be smaller than feared, we thought, or the barriers are working better than the doomsayers want to believe. More

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Cries to halt Chicago canal traffic because of carp are opposed

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(MI) Detroit Free Press – As Michigan’s attorney general prepares to file lawsuits this week to force Illinois and federal agencies to do more to keep Asian carp out of the Great Lakes, some members of Congress also are mounting an anti-carp assault.

They say the time has come to close off a system of Chicago canals that allows invasive species to move between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River basin. More

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Asian carp raises fear and loathing on Great Lakes

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(MI) The Associated Press – After nearly four decades as a fishing guide on the Great Lakes, Pat Chrysler has seen enough damage from invasive species to fear what giant, ravenous Asian carp could do to the nation’s largest bodies of freshwater. “It’s like introducing piranhas to the Great Lakes,” Chrysler said from South Bass Island in Lake Erie, which teems with walleye, perch and other fish that draw anglers from near and far. More

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Lock to lake open after carp hunt ends

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(MI) Detroit Free Press – State and federal agencies hunting for Asian carp have reopened a critical lock leading to Lake Michigan that was closed last week, after failing to find any Asian carp there. Crews dragged fishing nets through a 5 1/2 -mile stretch of the Cal-Sag channel near the O’Brien lock; it was closed to barges during the net operation Friday. The channel is an offshoot of the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, and the lock is just 6 miles from Lake Michigan. More

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Netting operation yields no Asian carp past electric barrier

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(WI) Milwaukee Journal Sentinel – Federal officials reported late Tuesday that a large-scale netting operation on a Chicago-area waterway above the electric fish barrier has yielded no Asian carp. Three weeks ago the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced that water samples in the Cal-Sag channel about six miles south of Lake Michigan tested positive for Asian carp DNA. More

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Fish kill called necessary to save the Great Lakes

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(DC) The Washington Post – The poisoned fish began floating to the surface in the cold Illinois dawn, but as scientists and ecologists began hauling their lifeless catch to shore, they found only one carcass of the predator they targeted — the ravenous Asian carp. Never before have Illinois agencies tried to kill so many fish at one time. By the time the poison dissipates in a few days, state officials estimate that 200,000 pounds of fish will be bound for landfills. But they say the stakes — the Great Lakes ecosystem and its healthy fish population — could hardly be higher. More

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When It’s OK to Poison Fish

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(NY) New York Times – As the SuperFreakonomics chapter on global warming suggests, solutions that are initially viewed as repugnant sometimes gain acceptance over time. Consider, for example, that environmental groups have supported a “last-ditch effort” by Illinois environmental officials to dump a toxic chemical into a canal. The purpose? To target and kill the giant and destructive Asian carp from entering the Great Lakes and potentially bringing about the “collapse of the Great Lakes sport and commercial fishing industry.” More