Here's Part 3 of the excellent Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel series on the invasion of the Great Lakes by non-native aquatic species. Great work by reporter Dan Egan.
http://www.jsonline.com/news/state/dec04/286806.asp
Please note the dire urgency of the threat posed by Asian carp, and the somewhat less-than-urgent response of the governments responsible for stopping them from getting to the Lakes:
Great Lakes advocates who had to scramble to find $9 million to build a carp barrier on the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal - which links the Illinois River with Lake Michigan - are baffled as to why the government would risk leaving wide open another door to invasions.
"It's clear-cut to me. It's clear-cut to all of us working night and day to get the (carp) barrier built," says Marc Gaden, spokesman for the Great Lakes Fishery Commission, which helps coordinate fishery management decisions across the region. "If I sound incredulous, it's because I am."
A likely reason for the holdup is political pressure from the Southern fish-farming industry, which uses one type of Asian carp to control parasite-carrying snails in their fishery operations. Fish farmers also raise bighead to sell to Asian fish markets in places such as Illinois and Canada.