Keep Asian Carp Out Of The Great Lakes

[skeeter]

Gee fellers, how's it feel when the shoe is on the other foot ? A little thin skinned, aren't we, when your guy is in office and in charge and screwing up while bowing and kowtowing to obvious monetary pressures ?? Seems like the politicos really are all alike aren't they ? "Crap"? Hardly.... it's a legitimate criticism that you don't want to hear.

Go back and read some of the " W " bashing that went on. Did you conveniently forget all that stuff ? Welcome to the real world, it's a two way street. It's hilarious to hear you obvious Obama backers whine about complaints and watch you squirm with disbelief at how your guy caves to the ultimate political goal.....raise campaign funds to get re-elected and to heck with the consequences. Change ??.... my fat fanny !!!

Close the darn locks whether they leak or not. That waterway connecting Chi-town and L. Michigan to the Illinois R. was originally hand dug to flush Chicago's sewage down the Illinois River and into the Mississippi rather than discharge into L. Michigan and then try and use the lake for the City water supply. The Lampreys, Zebra mussels and the Goby's were/are bad enough.

[fishgypsy]

Politicians catering to their constituents isn't anything new, it's part of the political process. There's a lot of folks who rely on the Chicago shipping canal for jobs and transportation. That Obama, a Chicago/Illinois politician, wants to keep it open, isn't that big of a surprise.

Mark Cox (the MI Attorney General running the website linked to above), is looking out for the interests of the Michigan tourism and recreation industry, as well as the state's sportsmen. I'm sure his candidacy for governor of MI this year has nothing to do with his decision to tackle this issue

I think the canal needs closed, I think it should've been closed when we realized the economic impacts species like zebra mussels were having in the Great Lakes and elsewhere. Otherwise there could be some serious repercussions for numerous fisheries in the Great Lakes.

Aside from closure, there has been some neat work with genetically modifying the fish in hopes of selectively eradicating them. Biologists have been working to insert a suicide gene, which would cause the fish to die when they reach sexual maturity. Another route is to insert genes which would only allow the fish to produce offspring of one sex or another, a la' Jurassic Park. Neat stuff.

[Quillback]

I agree that the right thing to do is to close the access from the canal to the lake. Of course the barge owners would squeal and holler, but the answer to them should be, we have a problem, help us solve it and when it's solved we can reopen the access to the lake. If the energy and time spent squealing to the politicians was spent on solving this issue, we'd already have it fixed by now. We need an invasive species czar that can act to solve the problem and have the full powers to implement the solution. Otherwise we're always going to be held hostage by special interests who could care less about what swims in the water as long as they can make money.

[ozark trout fisher]

"Crap"? Hardly.... it's a legitimate criticism that you don't want to hear.

Look, I'm perfectly willing to criticize Obama for his decision on this. It's seems pretty obvious to me he's doing the wrong thing.

But that doesn't mean I have any intention of joining on your blatant political attacks (nobamahead carp? Really? It not even creative). I'm tired of the nastiness that has to surround everything remotely political these days.

[skeeter]

Politicians catering to their constituents isn't anything new, it's part of the political process. There's a lot of folks who rely on the Chicago shipping canal for jobs and transportation. That Obama, a Chicago/Illinois politician, wants to keep it open, isn't that big of a surprise.

Mark Cox (the MI Attorney General running the website linked to above), is looking out for the interests of the Michigan tourism and recreation industry, as well as the state's sportsmen. I'm sure his candidacy for governor of MI this year has nothing to do with his decision to tackle this issue

I think the canal needs closed, I think it should've been closed when we realized the economic impacts species like zebra mussels were having in the Great Lakes and elsewhere. Otherwise there could be some serious repercussions for numerous fisheries in the Great Lakes.

Aside from closure, there has been some neat work with genetically modifying the fish in hopes of selectively eradicating them. Biologists have been working to insert a suicide gene, which would cause the fish to die when they reach sexual maturity. Another route is to insert genes which would only allow the fish to produce offspring of one sex or another, a la' Jurassic Park. Neat stuff.

That is "neat stuff" resorting to gene manipulation to solve this problem. Maybe that "suicide gene" can be introduced to the Zebra Mussel species too ?

From a layman's point of view I kind of question the single sex reproduction strategy as we know that certain fish are quite capable of changing their sex during their lifespans.

A couple of years ago the TV news reported about a plan to catch these fish and turn them into pet food in some way but either it wasn't feasible or was underfunded. I know the commercial fishermen up in the Grafton IL area have their equipment repeatedly just about destroyed by these carp due to sheer numbers of the darn things and it's made life on the Rivers tough and dangerous. Can you imagine being in a fast moving Bass rig and getting hit by one of these fish ?

There was an article in the St. Louis Post Dispatch Wed. or Thurs. about the recent cold snap killing possibly half of the invasive Pythons that got loose in the Everglades along with many species of non-native fish. The article went on to quote some figure in authority about the need for Federal law prohibiting the deliberate importation of live, non-native critters. At the end of the article some "deep-thinker" commented that to ban those imports would put ( in his words ) thousands of Floridians out of work and destroy an industry. ???!!! http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/lifestyle/stories.nsf/pets/story/E281EF631F55E376862576C80019B96B?OpenDocument

[fishgypsy]

I've read some similar things, that the St. Louis Zoo is using them as animal food, and that there are some folks toying with projects to turn them into fish oil and omega 3 pills. I think the real issue is capture- they tear up nets, and have the capacity to jump over them as well.

[drew03cmc]

Yeah, the truth hurts doesn't it ? http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_asian_carp_great_lakes

Edited to say, that was not nice.

[skeeter]

In the new budget, but no lock-closing details. Notice the "Great Lakes Coaltion's" comments. http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/illinoisnews/story/4557D7C3FE337DB0862576D200164758?OpenDocument

[drew03cmc]

Okay, why aren't the states whose economies are affected by the invasive species paying for this? Why the hell am I, in Kansas, paying for conservation of the Great Lakes with my tax dollars? I have never been to the Great Lakes, and have no intention of going any time soon. It is a pity that the artificial sportfisheries of salmon and steelhead might suffer. I want to see someone, somewhere, do something for native fisheries. Why should we, hours from there, two states away, have our tax dollars used for something like this? I am all for conserving your local resources, but something like this should fall on the states that are impacted directly. If the Michigan economy is suffering due to the sportfisheries being harmed, then the state of Michigan should pay for the recovery efforts. Same with Illinois, New York, etc.

[Guest]

Well, tax money spent on fishing license sales gets doled out to all of the states, so indirectly it would hurt all states. I totally agree that more needs to done to address native species, but those are going to be affected just like the non-native species in the great lakes.

The problem here is the lack of foresight, we can either cut the great lakes off from the Illinois river (which was natural) or we can spend millions of dollars in building electric/sound barriers to keep them from getting into the great lakes, which they might get past anyways. I think that we should stop importing potentially harmful species into our country--both intentionally or unintended (ballast water or fish tank releases). There is no reason that we should be raising foodfish (silver and bighead carp) in a country where they did not evolve and do not belong, especially in an area that is prone to flooding.