New fish packs punch
07/01/2012
Dayton Daily News
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A new fish species arrived this week in the Ohio River, but don't spend too much time searching for it in the water.
Chances are good it will find you first.
The Asian silver carp, an invasive species imported decades ago from Southeast Asia, is known for leaping up to eight feet out of the water when startled by fishermen, water skiers, pleasure boaters and anyone else unfortunate enough to disturb it.
Dozens or even hundreds of the skittish fish have been known to jump at the same time, turning themselves into 20-pound missiles capable of breaking boat equipment and the occasional nose.
“They have pretty solid heads,” said Jeff Thomas, the biological programs manager for the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission. “I've been hit by them. I've been hit everywhere.”
The discovery of the silver carp this week at the mouth of the Great Miami River in far western Hamilton County is a first in the Cincinnati region, and biologists say their arrival is bad news for everyone. They say the carp not only will spread along the Ohio River, but up tributaries such as the Great Miami, the Licking River and others.
The carp invasion joins a growing list of foreign species, such as the zebra mussel and the emerald ash borer, that have wreaked havoc since coming to America.
Global travel and trade has made it easy for species to jump from their native habitats to new ones, and the silver carp have adapted exceptionally well to life in the American South and Midwest.
With the sighting in Ohio, the fish now has been found in 16 states, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
“You guys are going to be sad,” said James Gar-vey, director of the Center for Fisheries at Southern Illinois University. “It could be a real problem.”
Although silver carp are stars on YouTube, where they can be seen bursting from the water as boats zip by, they have been a scourge to both humans and native fish species for decades.
They spawn as often as three times a year and one female can produce millions of eggs.
They crowd out other species and are voracious eaters, consuming so much plankton that the food chain gets thrown out of whack.
Other plankton eaters, including larval fish, are left with less food, and fish that feed on those species have fewer and skinnier fish to hunt.
Meanwhile, the Asian silver carp has few predators, in part because no North American fishes are large enough to eat an adult silver carp.
Silver carp, one of several varieties commonly referred to as Asian carp, arrived in North America decades ago when catfish farmers imported them to eat pond algae.
