Anybody heard about the bighead carp caught last week in the St Croix? I haven’t seen it mentioned in very many places.
April 24, 2012 at 12:06 pm
#1222616
Asian carp
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April 24, 2012 at 12:16 pm #1061860
Hmmm…Stadium bill must be more important…at this time.
April 24, 2012 at 12:33 pm #1061870Since they have made it this far, but their populations haven’t exploded like they have farther south, doesn’t it make you think that our climate just isn’t warm enough for them?
April 24, 2012 at 12:44 pm #1061873That’s what I’ve been saying as well. They’ve been in the system for over 30 years.
Eels have made it from the Sargasso Sea (Bermuda Triangle) to the St. Croix River in numbers…even with all the dams ect in place. Why haven’t the Asian Carp population taken off? Not enough food, climate not suitable…they know the MN DNR is being pressured into throwing millions of dollars at them?? Maybe they’ve read the AIS stickers people are placing on the bottom of their boat hulls?
IL DNR says the carp have not made it further up stream than 6 miles of the electric barriers.
April 24, 2012 at 12:57 pm #1061877I’ll give that an armchair maybe. I don’t know when they first found them down south, but I believe it is relatively recently, 10-20 years ago?
I think there is a good chance that they can’t really establish themselves up here.
Being plankton feeders, the plankton drops considerably (I assume) up here in the winter with ice and snow cover. I know the silver carp grow very fast and only live a few years. Any amount of drop off in food is going to starve them. That’s why we don’t see too many paddlefish up this way.
However there is always plankton. Shad live relatively short lives and eat plankton too. But they also don’t get very big and also produce huge numbers of fry.
Since their size is closer to paddlefish than to shad, I think they will have a hard time establishing themselves.
I am guardedly optimistic. I am less optimistic about how this “scare” will be abused.
Never waste a good donut.
April 24, 2012 at 12:58 pm #1061878Quote:
That’s what I’ve been saying as well. They’ve been in the system for over 30 years.
Eels have made it from the Sargasso Sea (Bermuda Triangle) to the St. Croix River in numbers…even with all the dams ect in place. Why haven’t the Asian Carp population taken off? Not enough food, climate not suitable…they know the MN DNR is being pressured into throwing millions of dollars at them?? Maybe they’ve read the AIS stickers people are placing on the bottom of their boat hulls?
IL DNR says the carp have not made it further up stream than 6 miles of the electric barriers.
Yep, I think you are right. Not enough food (algae) in the northern waters. It all but disapears in the winter…the rivers are vertually crystal clear. They just aint gonna stay around if there aint no food. Good…stay in the south then…we don’t want them up here.
Not sure about the temperature thing. Might be too cold for them, but I think the lack of food source is really the deal.
L8R…Ken
April 24, 2012 at 1:17 pm #1061887Hmmmmm…So maybe the Zebra Mussels are eating enough algae and stuff to clear up the water and starve the Asian Carp. I wonder what we do with our boat stickers now?
April 24, 2012 at 2:23 pm #1061927Quote:
Hmmmmm…So maybe the Zebra Mussels are eating enough algae and stuff to clear up the water and starve the Asian Carp. I wonder what we do with our boat stickers now?
LOL, good observation.When we talk about plankton, we have to realize it is much more than algae. There are significant amounts of zooplankton that live through the winter. Enough to sustain carp? Not 100% sure, but the fluctuation I bet is enough to keep them from establishing in big enough numbers to be a threat. That’s a calculated risk though, we choose to except that they cannot.
You would think with all the studies that they could determine that by now. It would be pretty obvious if that as they spread north, the population growth slowed and numbers were lower.
April 24, 2012 at 5:23 pm #1062018I haven’t done much reading on them so are they a threat to other game fish like cats? I personaly like eating carp and they put up a good fight on the line. Coarse that’s regular carp. I spect the asian variety wouldn’t be much diffrent would they?
April 24, 2012 at 5:26 pm #1062023Quote:
I haven’t done much reading on them so are they a threat to other game fish like cats? I personaly like eating carp and they put up a good fight on the line. Coarse that’s regular carp. I spect the asian variety wouldn’t be much diffrent would they?
These ones are exclusively filter feeders, so angling opportunities basically amount to snagging. Since they eat plankton that various other animals in the ecosystem eat, they out compete them and throw off the whole balance when they have totally infested a system.
April 24, 2012 at 6:21 pm #1062056Two DNR biologists commented that flats would be important in keeping the Asian Carp in check buy eating them.
Might be the reason we only have seen a dozen in the last 30 years.
Very bony I’m told, but good eating. ‘Course so is eel and walleye, I hear.
April 24, 2012 at 7:15 pm #1062075BK – can we petition the DNR for a study on the feasibility of releasing Wels cats to control the carp populations?
April 24, 2012 at 7:48 pm #1062089Quote:
Quote:
I haven’t done much reading on them so are they a threat to other game fish like cats? I personaly like eating carp and they put up a good fight on the line. Coarse that’s regular carp. I spect the asian variety wouldn’t be much diffrent would they?
These ones are exclusively filter feeders, so angling opportunities basically amount to snagging. Since they eat plankton that various other animals in the ecosystem eat, they out compete them and throw off the whole balance when they have totally infested a system.
I’ve read that people in the more, infested, areas have figured out a few ways to angle for them.
Nylon stockings, fill it up with some flour/doughball/oats what have you. tie it off in a ball, run some hooks through it (the more the better, but legal issues my apply up here depending on how you rig it) and apparently the carp will filter the flour out of the water, and go nuts for it, and eventually whack into the ball and hook themselves (most likely probably still a snag… but I think we might get away with that on invasive species.)
April 24, 2012 at 8:09 pm #1062099Think we’ll have to grind them up in the boat before touching shore?
There is no way we’ll be able to transport them as long as a nerve makes them wiggle.
April 24, 2012 at 8:12 pm #1062101Quote:
Think we’ll have to grind them up in the boat before touching shore?
There is no way we’ll be able to transport them as long as a nerve makes them wiggle.
Choppem up into channel cat bite sized chunks, and tossem back in! Help the younguns grow!
April 24, 2012 at 8:44 pm #1062120
Well, as of right now, that’s breaking the law too.In MN.
April 25, 2012 at 12:42 am #1062201Quote:
Eels have made it from the Sargasso Sea (Bermuda Triangle) to the St. Croix River in numbers…even with all the dams ect in place.
Did you really just compare Asian carp…in the system for 30 years…to eels…in the system for thousands of years?
April 25, 2012 at 1:24 am #1062209
Quote:
Very bony I’m told, but good eating. ‘Course so is eel and walleye, I hear.
In a couple different ways.
Quote:
To reach Minnesota waters, they must travel nearly 1,700 miles up the Mississippi, swimming through 18 locks and dams.
Yup, I did. You caught me.
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