Home of the best Bengals coverage and those Cincinnati Reds. Danny, good morning to you, sir. I really appreciate this. This is a complex situation this morning, and we'll.
Have it all straight now. Alrighty, jumping right to it.
Got my issue of Ohio Autor News about it was a couple issues ago, and they're in the story. Nearly forty six million pounds of carp removed in Illinois. I thought that was intriguing and that was the first half of the year. So digging into it and tracking it down.
We have what.
Is known as the Invasive Carp Regional Coordinating Committee, and I welcome Janet Lebson with the US Fish and Wildlife Service.
Janet, good morning, how are you?
Good morning, Chip, Thank you for inviting me to join you and your listeners this morning.
Well, this is fantastic And in thirty one years I've ever had anyone from the Fish and Wildlife Service, Shame on me. But that is about to change drastically going down the road, because there's a lot of other subject matter out there to cover. Nonetheless, coming back to this, this is a huge regional coordinating committee and I hadn't I hadn't realized that this existed until my story came in my Ohio Outdoor News. So you could give us an overview, that'd be fantastic.
Sure, I'd be happy to And maybe I should start by saying, the partnership that you're referring to is focused on the Great Lakes region and keeping Karp out of the Great Lakes, but there's a whole other partnership for the Mississippi River basin that involves just as many partners. In fact, altogether there are forty seven partners formally joined
up in partnership to manage the invasive carp situation. So one reason I wanted you to have Brian also on your show is because Brian is very much involved with in leading in both of those partnerships.
So you get this the.
Whole big picture there.
That's exactly what we need, is the whole big picture, because in twenty minutes, that's the hell of a picture to paint for our listeners out there. Even though they're all in the woods, are heading to the woods going deer hunting or maybe duck hunting or something like that, we're by the same token, we're anglers too, So we appreciate and love our waterways that we use during the balance of the year.
But what this covers what four species of carp?
Yes, there are four different kinds. When we use the term and base of carp. There's a big head carp, silver carp, grass carp, and black carp. And the kind that most people tend to know about are the silver carp because they notoriously leap out of the water when they're disturbed by a boat. And I'm guessing a lot of your listeners have seen the tons of YouTube video there are on this and of course can be a very big safety issue as.
But the coordinating groups, and there's a lot of them, are they under the auspices of the US Fish and Wildlife Service or you're just a partner.
We're a partner, and we have a leading role in it because of the federal funding that's come into it. So, for example, the Mississippi River Basin Partnership has been around for a long time. The states came together to manage fisheries better in general, and then the karp situation just kept getting worse and worse, and so that became one of their focus areas and so we have a role
in that one. But then the Great Lakes One started in twenty ten when people started to get more and more concerned that they were going to get into the Great Lakes through the Chicago Area Waterway because of the abundant population in the Illinois River where there's that access there.
So overall, where are we in the process of management? I mean, that's really kind of a loaded question, But are are we at a certain stage or a point in time from I guess your perspective.
Yeah, let me give you a little perspective on that. I think things have changed a lot over the last fifteen years because of these partnerships coalescing and because of the federal state collaboration on this and Congress providing more funding so that we could do more, and what we're doing to try to protect recreational fishing opportunities and native fisheries and the communities that are relying on tourism and other water recreation to help with that. What we're trying
to do is three main things. Even though the situation with KARP is different in different parts of the Mississippi River basin, there are three main we're doing. The first one is targeted mass removal, getting massive amounts of fish out of the water, and those efforts are led by the States, and Brian can tell you all about that.
I'll tell you what.
That is a great place for us to kind of take a quick break. Then we when we come back, we'll get the other I guess second and third portions of that. And at the same time we'll get Brian Schoening in here, who's the Aquatic News and Species program manager out of the Illinois DNR.
So everybody sit tight.
This is tough on my end, even tougher on everybody else's in my producer's going down seven hundred WLW Cincinnati, Big Outdoors back in a moment. Hey, we're back the Big Outdoors News Radio seven hundred WLW Cincinnati, home of the best Bengals coverage in the Cincinnati.
Reds and much more. But we'll save that for later.
So Janet Lebson is with me, she's with the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and Brian Schoening is joining us with the Illinois d n R. We're talking about the invasive carp programs on kind of the big world view in the US, and Janet, we were kind of had to go pay some bills catch that break and so there's two other parts to the where we are at this stage in time.
Yes, I was saying, targeted mass removal is one of the main things we do to manage a base of CARP, and developing deterrent technologies and barrier constructing barriers is the second big thing we do. And the third thing is widespread monitoring. And that's significant in the sense that it informs the other two and it helps us prioritize where to do the mass removal and what kind of technologies
we might need in different places, et cetera. And I just wanted to mention since you do have a lot of anglers listening, I hope they'll never underestimate how important it is and they encounter invasive KLARP to let their state DNR know and to if they can take a moment to learn to accurately id the fish, because even one person finding one in an area that we didn't know about can really help with our prevention.
Well, and this neck of the woods at least, that sims downy area, but you know beyond, but you've got the Ohio River and there's a lot of people out there fishing for sawguy right now, which will continue through probably February of March. So you know, who knows what what might turn up, and so I Jana Hope just
kind of hang on and listen in if you will. Brian, let me bring you in with the Illinois DNR, because I guess the referral to forty six million pounds of clarp removed in Illinois in a half a year or first half of twenty twenty five is this huge.
I mean, that's a lot of dogfit.
So that number is a cumulative number of the course of the last several years. Typically, what we do as far as removal on the Illinois River is about somewhere between six and eight million pounds a year with our commercial fishing incentive program, and then we have contracted fishers in the upper part of the river that remove a million million and a half a year.
So if we take those two numbers on.
An annual base, it's roughly about ten million pounds out of the Illinois River. We also are engaged with Mississippi River. Illinois is kind of unique and that we've got this connection to the Great Lakes see the Illinois River, but we also have a footprint in the Mississippi River and the Ohio River. So we're involved with a whole host of other partners working on removal programs. We're actually we administer instead of programs for process or removal in Kentucky
and Barkley Lakes. Even so, we're working with Kentucky, We're working with Indiana, we're working with Tennessee, with Missouri. This is a problem that needs to have a big vision approach to it. No single state is going to be able to really move the needle in a meaningful way. It needs to be a collaborative effort across sub basins and the entire Mississippi River basin to really have the impact that we'd.
Like has there any I don't recall anything of this magnitude in terms of a species of fish, at least fish you know in my lifetime.
Is that accurate?
Yeah?
So the analog I guess would be.
Sea lamper in the Great Lakes.
Right.
These things came in in the fifties and started wreaking havoc across and it required all of the Great Lake states and provinces to come together and work on solutions. And we're essentially re implementing that model with these particular fish within the Mississippi River basin, and so we've always had a collaborative work environment as it related to inner jurisdictional fish within the Mississippi River micro which is miss simeor State Cooperative Resource Association, has led that since the
early nineties. It's not official or you know, sort of government sanctioned, but we are working towards that end as well. With uh, we've got actually a couple of bills in Congress for the establishment of a Mississippi River Basin Fisheries Commission, which would you know, help to facilitate more of this work and more alignment in programs and make sure that we're implementing a unified collaborative approach across the basin. And you know, that's really where we need to be.
Well that and it's a good point to kind of hit a break because I've got quite a few questions.
Will never cover everything we need to in that five to.
Five thirty slot we're here sitting in for la last thirty one years, but we're going to do our damned chip Hart the Big Outdoors News Radio seven hundred WLW Cincinnati will be back in a moment. Chip Haart, Gary Jeff will be wandering in here at the bottom of the hour and I'll let him talk to you about the rest of the day because I got too much to do this morning.
So Brian, Brian showing us with us.
He is the Aquatic Nuisance Program manager with the Illinois DNR and part of this huge car coordinating committee or committees, there's multiple committees. Have they acted, Brian, have any of the species? Well, what do you what's the most concerning species? You mentioned this? I think Janet earlier mentioned the silver car. Has that gotten into like Lake Michigan through what was that the Chicago River or any other you know, I guess tributary.
So the silver car primarily confined below Dresden Island dam ounta of Probably your listeners are not familiar with Illinois, and it took me a little lot to get familiar with this as well. But yeah, there's a there's an electric barrier that is sort of close to Lake Michigan, and they have not really been found. We picked up maybe two fish over the course the last fifteen years.
Above that. We do extensive monitoring in the spring and the fall, using DNA as well as traditional fishing gears to to sort of monitor that to make sure that we're not getting any fish through there, So pretty confident that they're not in in Lake Michigan within the Ohio River basin. Probably they're all the way up to Pennsylvania, but the numbers are really not significant above about marklan Pool, I'd say, so, yeah, so you know that area that that area right there is sort of kind of a
little bit of the leading edge there. We don't have reproduction up there, but we do have some adult fish. And then you know the Mississippi River. They're up in the Mississippi. But again that that sort of reproductive front is about midway and that's sort of, you know, the measure that we use to what, you know, how effective we can be at controlling the populations. If we can get fishing in place and places where we don't have reproduction,
we can really reduce numbers pretty significantly. And we've seen that in Kentucky and Barkley Lakes. The coordinated commercial fishing has reduced populations and they have not really seen any reproduction in those two lakes. So it's had an overall positive impact on those those native fisheries. You know, the bassa crappy, the things that people go to those lakes to fish for, so you know, we're trying to implement those same sort of approaches within these other river basins as well.
Back to the commercial fishing part, seems is that the most effective. So what are these fish being used for that are commercially caught.
So depending on which processor is buying them, there's any number of things that they could be used for. A lot of the fish go into fish meal, some of it into fertilizer. Some is used for bait for either crawlfish down south, you know the crawl fresh boils. They use a bait for net or lobster, the same sort of thing there. Some of it is used for pet food and then there's also growing human consumption avenue as well.
This is actually these are.
The most consumed fish species in the world, all across the world. Yeah, it's a recognized, highly sought after and desired fish. The meat is light white and flaky. It's very much like a crappie. The problems are just bony.
So it's hard to get American consumers to adopt something that you know, it's it's not your traditional cod or perch filet, so it makes it a little bit harder sell but we've worked on that end as well with our Illinois launched a copy initiative so several years ago, which is this sort of a rebranding effort, similar to what they did with Orange Ruffy or Chilean sea bass. Those fish were respectively known as you know, slime head
and Patagonia two fish. So you know, we spent thirty plus years convincing people that these fish were the worst thing in the world right and that they're going to destroy everything. It makes it really challenging to do a pivot and then say, oh, by the way, they're good to eat too, and you should give them a try. Well, I mean, we're pretty open, but I know if we use the you know, the Kopi is the name we came up with the playoff of copious, and we've gotten
some traction with it. There's some folks that have adopted it, and you know, it's tested really well.
I mean, I'm not a.
Market I'm a fish biologist, so you know that's where I come in.
Okay, Well, we got to hit a short break, but you know I want to We'll continue putting this out there, but we'll do the break, come back and tell how people can get evolved and get more information and gosh, I got so much more to ask, but I'll just have to set that for another day. Chip Hart by guest Brian showing with Illinois d n R and of course Janet with the US Fish and Wildlife Service, the Big Outdoors, this radio seven hundred WLW Cincinnati.
Sure ask for sustainable seafood.
And it lives in with US Fish and Wildlife Service. Would you like to give everybody an opportunity to do an Internet search for specifics on your end?
Yeah, what I would recommend is we have a pretty comprehensive website called Managing Invasive Carps. So if they use that as the Google search with US Fish and Wildlife Service should.
Take you there.
Fantastic Brian shooning with the Illinois DNR And if people want to find out more about what's happening on your.
End, yeah, so I would say, you know, Invasivecarp dot us is the ic ic R c C website, microrivers dot org is the Mississippi River Basin, and then of course we've got Illinois DNR. Folks are interested in what we're doing at twoscope dot com, which is another website with the human consumption market in mind. Yeah, I just encourage your listeners. I mean, you've got district biologist, fisheries biologists in your state. It for you, and they love to hear from you. They want to hear from you.
If you've got questions, if you need answers to particular things, or if you see something that you think is strange, by all means, reach out to those folks. Go to your agency's website to list the biologists. You can find the right contact, or just call the general number.
They'll get in touch with the right person.
We work for the fishermen, so yes, we're here for you absolutely.
And you know around here it's like you create. You create the market first and then fulfill it. Okay, that was an old WBN thing. That was another radio station. Okay, hey, hey the two of you, thank you very much. I appreciate and uh, we'll put it up on a Big Outdoors Facebook page. But after that go to podcasts for more Chip part the Big Outdoors News Radio seven hundred WLW Cincinnati'd be safe in the woods, safe on the water, and safe in that tree stand.