Canadian biologists are in the United States trying to prevent a large, hungry, and invasive fish from making its way into the Great Lakes, where it could threaten native species and cost the fishing industry hundreds of millions of dollars.
Biologists from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) are working with a team of Illinois environmental officials trying to stop the spread of the Asian carp, which have been found in a canal dangerously close to Lake Michigan, according to DNA testing.
"We've had long days. Some of our shifts worked to one in the morning," said Becky Cudmore, senior science advisor for aquatic and invasive species for DFO.
She is one of 18 Canadians in the state to help the U.S. stop the fish from spreading uncontrollably into Lake Michigan and the Great Lakes system.
"This is an enormous operation," she told CTV.ca in a telephone interview after the end of her shift, explaining there are 400 people working on the project.
"It's a lot of work but everything's been very positive ... I'm really proud of the team from Canada, we've got a lot of complements from the U.S. They've noted how hard we're working and they're really happy that we were able to come and help out," she said.
Environmental officials warn that if the Asian carp makes its way into the Great Lakes, it would starve out native fish and devastate the fishing industry.
According to a 2006 survey by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service, the Great Lakes fishing industry is worth $7 billion.
In 2002, the Great Lakes Protection Fund found that Asian carp would cause much more ecological and economic damage than the infamous zebra mussel invasion.
Evidence of the fish has been found in a Chicago canal, about a 30-minute drive from the shores of Lake Michigan.
DNA tests show the carp may have even touched an electric barrier meant to stop the fish from getting in the lake.
A dangerous species
Cudmore said the Asian carp has already devastated native species populations in the Mississippi River basin.
"For every 10 fish you pull out of the river, nine of them are Asian carp," she said.
Asian carp grow very quickly and have no natural predators in the Great Lakes, so there are few factors to control their growth.
One carp can consume many times its body mass in small plants and animals at the bottom of the food chain, starving native fish, Cudmore said.
And that body mass is impressive, with one fish weighing as much as a teenager.
The Asian carp can grow to be more than a metre long and weigh up to 45 kilograms.
They were first imported into the U.S. by fish farms, but they escaped into the Mississippi river in the 1990s due to flooding. They've since moved north.
As of 2002, the carp could be found 80 kilometres south of Lake Michigan. They've crept up 40 kilometres closer to the lake in recent years.
Aside from stealing food from native fish, they are known to jump more than a metre out of the water when disturbed. There are reports that the fish have even injured fishermen.
Dumping poison
The electric barrier used to block the fish was turned off for routine maintenance Thursday, and Illinois environmental officials dumped 900 kilograms of Rotenone, a fish and insect poison, into the canal in hopes of killing off the carp.
As of Friday, 90,000 kilograms of native fish were found dead, but just one dead Asian carp surfaced. Biologists say they still have to search through all the dead fish for another day or two in order to see if any more carp bodies turn up.
"It wasn't unexpected to find Asian carp and the good news is that we didn't find an awful lot of them," Cudmore said.
"It's a very good thing ... with low numbers we can still be in prevention mode."
One Canadian team is cleaning up the dead fish and another is pouring a chemical to neutralize the poison, so it doesn't unnecessarily leak into other areas.
The program is completely funded by the U.S. The Canadians, mostly from Ontario, made the trip Tuesday after U.S. officials asked for help.
Cudmore said it is common for Americans and Canadians to work together when it comes to invasive species, since the fish can easily swim north.
She said the effort was costing the Americans so much money that they were asking for donations of chemicals, equipment and staff to help bring down the cost. The Illinois Department of Natural Resources did not return calls Friday.
On Friday, an Obama administration advisor said the locks that open into Lake Michigan could soon be ordered temporarily closed in order to prevent the fish from getting into the lake.
Meanwhile, the governor of Michigan has threatened to sue if the locks weren't shut.
Cameron Davis, the Great Lakes adviser to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, told The Associated Press that the lock would be closed within two days.
Officials say they want to wait and see if any more carp bodies turn up before closing it. Any closures interrupt the region's important shipping lanes.
With files from The Associated Press
