Originally Posted by
fishpoint
I met the Director for the Cook County Forest Preserves and chatted with him about the Asian Carp problem. He was one of the guys who helped with the 'fish kill' in the Fall. He told me that bighead carp are already in Lake Erie but are not thriving. He said the plankton was more abundant in Lake Erie compared to Lake Michigan. On that basis, he didn't seem to think the Asain Carp would fare very well in Lake Michigan.
I've seen the data on most of those bighead carp in lake Erie. They were VERY fat fish. They were doing VERY WELL. Anyone who says that individual bighead carp were not thriving in Lake Erie does not know what he is talking about. However, there is no evidence that they are reproducing there. There have been 5 bighead carp caught in Lake Erie, the last more than years ago. There probably are just not enough fish there to establish a population. I know of a lake in Hungary which also has VERY fat fish, that has open water productivity only a little higher than Lake Michigan. And there are parts of Lake Michigan that are very productive, like Green Bay and near other river mouths, where the carp could put on a lot of weight. Plus, the carp have other ways they can feed effectively other than on zooplankton an phytoplankton. The carp will survive in the Great Lakes. The question is whether they will reproduce enough there to be a problem.