Outdoor News Daily

MADISON – The chemical treatment of the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal that gets underway Dec. 2 is an important effort to keep Asian carp from getting a toehold in the Great Lakes, Wisconsin’s Natural Resources secretary says.

“We must work together to protect the Great Lakes – the world’s largest fresh water ecosystem and a foundation of our region’s future economic success,” says DNR Secretary Matt Frank.

“Accordingly, I am sending seven Wisconsin DNR staff with experience in large treatments and chemicals to Illinois to help our partners prevent carp from getting into the Great Lakes while the barrier is down.”

The 6-mile stretch of the ship canal is being treated with Rotenone, a naturally occurring chemical, to keep any Asian carp that might be in the canal from swimming through an electrical barrier while it is turned off during maintenance work. Results of DNA analysis work released earlier this month suggest some Asian carp are already upstream of the barrier.

“Even if recent test results are confirmed to show that Asian carp are upstream of the barrier, it does not mean they are in sufficient numbers to get established in the Great Lakes,” he says. “If the treatment can help keep any or most out during the maintenance work, the project will have been well worth doing.”

He noted that Asian Carp have been occasionally detected in Wisconsin’s Mississippi River waters but are not established or abundant in them. “We will continue to work with state and federal partners to find long-term solutions to protect the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River watershed.”

Phil Moy, the UW-Sea Grant Institute specialist on the Barrier Advisory Panel, said in an e-mail that the abundance of Asian carp, based on the DNA and other sampling efforts, is likely very low even in the areas upstream of the barriers. Even if small numbers are above the barrier, their success in naturally reproducing and getting established in Lake Michigan is not a given.

“These fish have spawning requirements met by less than a dozen tributaries in the Great Lakes,” Moy said. “They will still have to find the spawning habitat and each other to fertilize the eggs and the young need quiet backwater in which to develop.

“Though a few fish may have gotten past the barriers, there is no need to resign ourselves to the end of the Great Lakes ecosystem,” he said. “We must continue to strive to keep the numbers of fish spreading through the canal low and increase our efforts to create the long term physical separation necessary to protect these two great national drainage basins.”

Asian, or silver, carp are a concern for public safety and ecological reasons. Silver carp have been known to cause injury to boaters. The vibration of a spinning propeller excites these large fish and boaters have been struck when the fish leap out of the water. Invasive carp also damage aquatic plants important to native fish species, and important in protecting clean water.

Asian carp were imported by the aquaculture industry and the federal government for vegetation removal, snail control and as a source of protein. The four species imported were grass carp, bighead carp, silver carp and black carp. All have to some extent escaped into the wild, typically when flood waters carried them out of commercial ponds.

More of Moy’s answers to questions on the eve of the treatment and following the DNA results can be found on Seagrant Web site. [www.seagrant.wisc.edu].

More information about the treatment can be found on the multi-agency Web site, Asian Carp Rapid Response [www.asiancarp.org/rapidresponse/]. Questions regarding details of the operation should be directed to Chris McCloud, Illinois Department of Natural Resources, (217) 785-0075.

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