Can we exterminate silver carp?

[WRB]

6 hours ago, roadwarrior said:

Bring in the private sector. Invite pet food companies to "harvest" all these invaders with 

added incentive. Free fish and a $100 per ton bonus.

That is how the Silver Carp got here in the first place. 

Tom

[Bankc]

7 hours ago, roadwarrior said:

Bring in the private sector. Invite pet food companies to "harvest" all these invaders with 

added incentive. Free fish and a $100 per ton bonus.

Exactly what I was thinking.  

I mean a fish that wants to jump out of the water on command can't be THAT hard to control with a little investment and ingenuity.  

[Swamp Girl]

@roadwarrior has the right idea. Incentivize harvesting them. Turn them into a commodity. Then step back and watch capitalism consume them. Soon people will be pining for the days when the rivers flowed with silver. 

[TnRiver46]

15 hours ago, ol'crickety said:

@roadwarrior has the right idea. Incentivize harvesting them. Turn them into a commodity. Then step back and watch capitalism consume them. Soon people will be pining for the days when the rivers flowed with silver. 

The problem there is ……… create a way to make money off them and guess what…… the people making money want more of it. Then the goal is make more money with more fish, it does the opposite of eradication 

17 hours ago, WRB said:

That is how the Silver Carp got here in the first place. 

Tom

Exactly, meat market will only make the problem worse 

[TnRiver46]

On 2/28/2023 at 11:57 AM, Team9nine said:

Ain’t happening - save your time and money. They’re here; they’ll spread; and eventually the population will level off or even start collapsing under its own weight, and everything left will adapt accordingly.

This is the only logical path of action

 

which unfortunately is why state agencies won’t take that path of action, because it’s logical 

[Bluebasser86]

They've been in the rivers here for a couple decades, but they've never gone nuts like they have in other places. Native fish are still available in the river in good numbers. Big catfish have come to prefer them as a food source, so have the gar. Lots of common carp, buffalo, drum, suckers, white bass and wipers, sturgeon, and various other species still here. There are plenty of silvers and bigheads, but they haven't taken over like they were supposed to. 

[TnRiver46]

11 minutes ago, Bluebasser86 said:

, but they haven't taken over like they were supposed to. 

This is almost always the case with exotic species, yet everyone still assumes they will take over and kill everything 100% of the time 

 

we should all be so lucky to spend our free time worrying about things that don’t happen, beats real problems 

[MassBass]

If this fish is comparable to the Commons in Atlantic drainage rivers, you can forget eradication if they get established reproducing populations. They will have a profound effect on the system. Common carp is a particle feeder. They root at vegetation and the bottom. There is less rooted plants and probably more turbitity. It is outside of living memory what these rivers were like before their introduction. 

 

This fish is a filter feeder, which not only makes it a pain to fish for, but it will have big effects all through the food chain. Maybe you will see less little bait fish that also eat those plankton bits, etc. Like the Commons, the Snake head, the Northern Pike in some areas, it will assimilate and the sky will not fall, but the system will be different.