2023-Nov-24
Carp Spies? Scientists Are Hoping They Can Stop the Spread of Invasive Carp
Wildlife scientists are hoping they can turn invasive carp into traitors to slow their Great Lakes push. Over the last five years, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Minnesota Department of Natural Resources have employed a new strategy that uses turncoat carp to lead them to the fish’s hotspot hideouts.
Invasive carp are captured, implanted with transmitters and then released. Because carp often school in spring and fall, agency workers use the tagged fish to locate schools, monitor their movement and then drop nets to remove the fish from the ecosystem. From the Illinois-Iowa Quad Cities to the Iowa-Missouri border real-time tracking of the tagged fish has helped wildlife managers and anglers as much as double the poundage of invasive carp pulled from that area of river.
Four different species are considered invasive carp: bighead, black, grass and silver. These invasive fish are voracious eaters and wreak havoc on aquatic ecosystems. Fisheries experts have employed a host of defenses to attempt to prevent the fish from reaching the Great Lakes so far including electric barriers, walls of bubbles and herding the carp using underwater speakers. It is estimated that spending to attempt to stop the fish will hit $1.5 billion over the next decade.
Read more about the project here.