Asian Carp Hearings Spread Rapidly Throughout Great Lakes and Mississippi River Basins

Much like the invasive fish itself, hearings on the Army Corps’ multi-year study of potential solutions to the threat of Asian carp and other aquatic nuisance species moving between the Great Lakes and Mississippi River watersheds are spreading rapidly.  In an apparent effort to prove that they are listening to the concerns of citizens and business interests throughout the two regions, the Corps has already held hearings in Chicago, Buffalo, Cleveland, Minneapolis, Green Bay, and Traverse City.  Still to come is a hearing today in Cincinnati (near my hometown of Middletown, Ohio), hearings next week in Alton, IL (near St. Louis) and Vicksburg, MS, hearings the following week in Milwaukee and New Orleans, and a hearing in Ann Arbor, MI that has been rescheduled to next month.

I had the (perhaps dubious) honor of being the first person to speak at the first of these hearings, in Chicago.  In my comments, I emphasized that the Army Corps needs to move much more quickly to complete this important study, which was first directed by Congress in 2007 but which the Corps does not think it will be able to complete until 2015 or later (and even then, believes it would take many more years to implement a solution).  We cannot afford to wait that long if we are going to have any chance of preventing Asian carp from colonizing the Great Lakes.  NRDC’s own engineers with Shaw Environmental estimate that we could put in place an initial system of physical barriers to block the spread of invasive species much more quickly, using off-the-shelf technology:  as soon as 18 months of construction after all of the legal approvals are in.  That’s the kind of timeframe we need to be operating on if we are going to prevent our Great Lakes from being taking over by this big, hungry fish.

Why should people who live along the Ohio and Mississippi River care about what happens with the Chicago Waterway System?  Because this is not just about Asian carp – it’s about all of the other invasive species that are queued up to follow, in both directions.  Chicago’s canals have already been the source of the spread of a number of harmful invasive species that are doing damage throughout the United States.  Zebra mussels (and their cousin, quagga mussels) are the poster child for this.  After being introduced into the Great Lakes through the ballast water discharges of oceangoing vessels in the late 1980’s, zebra and quagga mussels are now clogging intake pipes and filtering out plankton all the way up and down the Mississippi River…  and have even hitch-hiked their way to Lake Mead.

There are at least 8 invasive species now in the Great Lakes that are poised to make the trip through the Chicago canal system into the Mississippi River Basin unless something is done, and done quickly, including the bloody red shrimp, the Eurasian ruffe, and the tubenose goby.  Each of these species, if established in the Ohio or Mississippi Rivers, would likely cause further reductions in native fish species and become yet another costly nuisance in our waters.

We need the Army Corps to take quick and effective action to stop these invasive species – but all we’ve gotten so far is interminable meetings and calls for more study.  I hope that the good folks in Cincinnati, Alton, Vicksburg, Milwaukee, New Orleans, and Ann Arbor will continue to deliver this message to the Corps.  Here are my comments – if you happen to be going to one of the hearings, I hope they can help to guide your statements too!

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