The Great Carp Caper

7/29/2019 The Great Carp Caper

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The crash of the Lake Erie whitefish andherring fishery in the late 1800s

President Ulysses Grant commissioned a study

Carp eggs were imported from Germanybetween 1877 and 1885

10,000 North American cities, counties, andstates participated

But.by 1896 it was clear that carp were ahuge mistake

The Canadian Government was furious


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This utterly stupid American experiment, thecarp, is a dismal and destructive failure whichthreatens the entire Great Lakes fishery. The

carp is a marauding hog which multiplies likevermin, tastes like dirt, and displaces nativespecies.


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There will be no more distribution of carpwhile I am in charge. The program was illadvised. The carp distribution program was afailed experiment.


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Year Great LakesWhitefish

Great LakesHerring

Lake ErieWhitefish

Lake ErieHerring

1880 24 19 3.6 4.8

1890 18 60 2.5 4.5

1900 8 69 3.2 44.51910 7 52 3.4 38.5


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Accidental travelers: zebra mussels, roundgobies, or lamprey eels, white perch

Introduced species: smelt, carp


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Artificial changes in the waterways bring them(Welland Canal and Lamprey Eels)

Dredging for commercial shipping has caused

problems Ocean-going ships brought hitchhikers (zebra

mussels, ruffes, and gobies)

The current list of almost 300 includes, fish,algae, plants, and viruses like vhs


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Protect the valuable Great Lakes commercialand sport fishery (1,400 commercial fishing

jobs in Ontario alone)

Prevent Asian carpfrom entering the GreatLakes Basin

Provide an early warning system

Develop a rapid response system Control the Asian carp population if (when) it

arrives


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Great Lakes commercial and recreationalfishing is $4 Billion per year industry

Ontarios commercial fishing had a $33 Million

dockside harvest in 2011 ($234 Million retail) Ontarios recreational fishing was a $600

Million retail industry in 2011

Aquaculture was a $60 Million retail industryin Ontario in 2011


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We sent away for them

For catfish farm ponds

Primarily in the mid-south

Within the Mississippi River drainage basin


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Why not use the backhoe to dig a pond and getsome catfish eggs?

Diversify: corn, tomatoes, beans, and catfish

The yummy catfish dinner Farm ponds

Fish poop

A miracle solution


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They are exactly like the algae-eating fish inyour home aquarium, but way bigger

Two primary species are commonly used

The bighead carp (Can reach 100 Pounds) The silver carp (Can reach 40 Pounds)

Each species eats 40% of its weight per day

A few farmers used either grass carp or thecommon carp leading some to call the invadersEurasian carp


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Unusually high water levels during spring 1994disrupted shipping on the Mississippi River

Many of the other tributary rivers including the

Ohio and Illinois also flooded Asian carp used the opportunity to escape from

their farm ponds

The clever rascals slithered across wet cornfields and meadows, and found their way intothe tributary river systems


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In late 2009 The Corps of Engineers tried amass poisoning

Naturally a few people were really upset

Not just tree-huggers And a few valuable fish were nuked!


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Each female silver carp lays between 27,000and 3.5 Million eggs each year

Each female bighead carp lays between 4,800

and 1.6 Million eggs each year Research suggests that as few as twelve carp in

a hospitable new environment can launch anentire population

Lake Erie provided the best possible bio-system for both species


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2,000 samples were taken from Great Lakesbasin waters

417 Samples from Lake Erie

Six Lake Erie samples tested positive for bighead carp DNA

Four in Sandusky Bay

Two in Maumee Bay


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Placed in Lake Michigan in 1912 to stimulatesport fishing

Migrated quickly downstream to Lake Erie

Threatened to fill Lake Erie and displace nativespecies by 1950

Have been implicated in the crash of the blue

pike during the 1950s A regulated trawling program begun in

Ontario in 1952 has now controlled them


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Where Patterson Creeks muddy waters run down

Past the penny arcades by the harbour downtown

And all the old turtlebacks rust in the rain

Like they never will leave there again

But leave there they will in the hours before dawn Slip out in the darkness without word or song

For a few years more they will work while they can

Just to catch tiny fish for Japan

These days run together each one is the same

And its good that the smelt has no lovelier name

Its all just a job now well work while we can

Just to catch tiny fish for Japan


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Year Millions of Pounds Harvested

1955 2.0

1960 11.5

1965 11.7

1970 9.41975 16.9

1980 25.1

1985 17.8

1990 12.1

1995 12.6

2000 10.6


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There are currently three fish processingbusinesses in Illinois which specialize in Asiancarp

In 2011, twenty million pounds were flashfrozen and exported to China and another 10million to Turkey and Indonesia

At a consortium meting, high end Chicagochefs have developed recipes for gourmetdishes that feature Asian carp


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Pet food

Portion fish products like fish sticks

Food Banks

Employment or business retrofit opportunities

Illinois offered a $20,000 retrofit grant for anycommercial river fishermen to equip his boat

Some Illinois fishermen report catching 15,000pounds per day in as little as three hours


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In 2011 Twenty-Million pounds of flash frozenAsian carp were shipped to China as an exportproduct

In 2011 Ten-Million pounds of Asian carp werereturned to North America in the form of flashfrozen fish products

Its a small world technical note: flash freezing

was invented by Eries (and Port Dovers)Robert Kolbe at Rensselaer University


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The Great Carp Caper

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