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It is a stark reminder that the Asian carp infestation that has overwhelmed stretches of river in the Mississippi River basin and is now threatening the waters of the Great Lakes isn't going to go away anytime soon: The Illinois Department of Natural Resources has hired a Louisiana chef for a made-for-media event this week to demonstrate just how good these fish can be to eat. It's part of the Target Hunger Now campaign, a state-sponsored humanitarian effort to turn the jumbo jumping carp into "healthy, ready-to-serve meals" for the needy. The program also provides venison to the poor. It...

WASHINGTON, D.C. --The U.S. House of Representatives adopted a bill Wednesday that makes it a criminal offense to import voracious Asian carp into the United States. The giant carp, which can weigh as much as 100 lbs., were legally imported to fish farms along the Mississippi River during the 1970s, but escaped during floods and spread north into Illinois. They consume vast amounts of food and could destroy Great Lakes fisheries if they evade barriers around Chicago that were designed to block them from entering the lakes. Share Tweet 12 Comments The bill passed the House by voice vote after...

DETROIT — The U.S. Senate has approved legislation that sponsors say aims to fight the spread of Asian carp into the Great Lakes. Author Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., says the Asian Carp Prevention and Control Act adds the bighead carp species of Asian carp to a list of injurious species. That prohibits the species from being imported or shipped in the U.S. Levin and Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, introduced the bill in July 2009. The Senate passed it Wednesday. A companion House bill that Rep. Judy Biggert, R-Ill., introduced is pending in the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and...

Realizing carp are a much greater threat to our national security than illegal immigration, the Obama administration appointed a Carp Czar yesterday to oversee federal response teams preventing Asian Carp from entering the Great Lakes. “When it comes to the Asian carp threat, we are not in denial. We are not in a go-slow mode. We are in a full attack, full-speed ahead mode,” says Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois. “We want to stop this carp from advancing.” “The carp, which have steadily moved toward Chicago since the 1990s, are aggressive eaters and frequently beat out native fish for...

The fish that could eat the Great Lakes is only 6 miles away from Lake Michigan now — maybe. The big, ugly and unbelievably hungry Asian carp has been making its way up the Mississippi for two decades and now appears to be closer than ever to migrating en masse to the world's largest body of fresh water. If it starts reproducing there, scientists say, it's likely to eventually consume much of the plankton that forms the basis of the food chain that supports what's estimated to be a $7 billion sports fishery. "These fish are extraordinarily prolific, and if...

An Asian carp was found for the first time beyond electric barriers meant to keep the voracious invasive species out of the Great Lakes, state and federal officials said Wednesday, prompting renewed calls for swift action to block their advance. Commercial fishermen landed the 3-foot-long, 20-pound bighead carp in Lake Calumet on Chicago's South Side, about six miles from Lake Michigan, according to the Asian Carp Regional Coordinating Committee.

CHICAGO – An Asian carp was found for the first time beyond electric barriers meant to keep the voracious invasive species out of the Great Lakes, state and federal officials said Wednesday, prompting renewed calls for swift action to block their advance. Commercial fishermen landed the 3-foot-long, 20-pound bighead carp in Lake Calumet on Chicago's South Side, about six miles from Lake Michigan, according to the Asian Carp Regional Coordinating Committee.

Executive Summary: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) was directed in WRDA 2007, Section 3061(b)(1)(D) to conduct a study of a range of options or technologies for reducing impacts of hazards that may reduce the efficacy of the Electrical Dispersal Barriers located on the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal (CSSC), hereafter referred to as the Efficacy Study. The Electrical Dispersal Barriers were designed to reduce the risk of inter-basin transfer of fish from the Mississippi River and Great Lakes drainage basins via the CSSC. It consists of three electrical barriers, Barrier I, IIA and IIB that comprise the Electrical...

I just hate cannibalism like this when one bottom feeder eats another. West side Alderman Walter Burnett (27th Ward) joined the Fox News Chicago team to eat some Asian carp per his ridiculous suggestion early last week that "the poor" could eat the Asian carp and cure the problem that Lake Michigan faces over the invasive species. For those unaware of the trouble with the bony Asian carp, the fish has been rapidly invading Illinois waterways and is headed straight for Lake Michigan. The Asian carp has no natural predators here and scientists think that the fish will wildly over...

At this week's National Grocers Association convention in Las Vegas, celebrity chef Philippe Parola was touting his new favorite fish. '[It has] 70-percent more Omega-3 than in catfish and tilapia," an animated Parola told an assembled crowd at his booth. "No mercury because it's a filter fish."

The White House said Wednesday it wants to hold a meeting in early February with Great Lakes governors concerned about Asian carp invading the lakes. The Democratic governors of Michigan and Wisconsin requested the summit Tuesday after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Michigan's request for a preliminary injunction to temporarily shut the shipping locks near Chicago and work out a way to stop the carp. (Snip)

CHICAGO (AFP) – Huge Asian carp, which act like "aquatic vacuum cleaners" and leap into the air when spooked by motorboats, may have invaded the US Great Lakes despite a massive effort to block them, officials said Tuesday. Researchers analyzing water samples have discovered fragments of Asian carp DNA in Lake Michigan, although there is still no evidence that that fast-breeding fish have breached electric barriers set up along Chicago-area waterways. "Clearly this is not good news," said Major General John Peabody, commanding general of the US Army Corps of Engineers' Great Lakes and Ohio River division. The Corps is...

LOCKPORT, Ill. — Wildlife officials discovered a single Asian carp Thursday in a canal leading to Lake Michigan, the nearest the destructive species has come to the Great Lakes, Illinois environmental officials said. Environmentalists fear that if the silver or bighead species of giant Asian carp reach the lakes they could starve out native fish species and devastate a $7 billion-a-year fishing industry. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials found the 22-inch immature specimen among tens of thousands of dead fish identified in a fish kill operation in the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, about 40 miles from Lake Michigan,...

CHICAGO – Illinois environmental officials will dump a toxic chemical into a nearly 6-mile stretch of the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal Wednesday to keep the voracious Asian carp from entering the Great Lakes while an electrical barrier is turned off for maintenance. The fish, which can grow to 4 feet long and 100 pounds and are known to leap from the water at the sound of passing motors, have been found within a few miles of Lake Michigan and there is evidence they might have breached the barrier, designed to repel them with a non-lethal jolt. Environmentalists fear the...

An underwater electric barrier between the Illinois River and Great Lakes will be switched on Wednesday in hopes of preventing the spread of invasive species between the two basins -- in particular the advance of the voracious and dreaded Asian carp. But until more safety testing can be done, the high-powered barrier will be turned on at only 1 volt per inch, the same level as a demonstration barrier that has existed in the Sanitary and Ship Canal since 2002. The voltage is just one quarter of the new barrier's potential power. Still, even a fraction of that voltage has...

Fish flies out of lake, breaks Arkansas teen's jaw Sun Sep 7, 8:26 PM ET LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - It's a fishing tale that packs a wallop so strong it broke the jaw of a southeastern Arkansas teen and covered him in fish blood and guts. Seth Russell, 15, of Crossett, was cruising Lake Chicot on a large inner tube towed by a boat when a Silver Asian carp leaped from the water and smacked him in the face. Seth was knocked unconscious. "He doesn't remember anything at all," the boy's mother, Linda Russell, said last week. "He was laughing,...