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By Frank Bi
Voices

One-fourth the size of Detroit’s Belle Isle, the village of Bath, Ill., isn’t on any maps.

Located on the Illinois River, the town of about 320 residents used to host traditional line and reel bass fishing tournaments, but that was before Asian carp started to show up in the river.

“They’ve overpopulated the river,” said Floyd Foutch, Bath’s mayor. “It has wiped out the game fish.”

Asian carp, brought over by aquaculture farmers in the 1970s from Asia, are believed to have escaped into the river following flooding in the American South.

Since then, the carp have continued to travel north, feeding on the plankton that native fish rely on and threatening a $7-billion fishing industry that could collapse if the fish species breaks into the Great Lakes – a concern lawmakers, fishermen and recreational boat users share.

For Bath resident Betty DeFord, the struggle to reclaim the river from the invasive species has become personal.

Years ago, a leisurely ride for DeFord and her grandchildren turned into a nightmare when they nearly capsized after hundreds of silver carp, notorious for leaping several feet out of the water, started jumping around them. Many landed in their boat.

“It was a bloody mess,” DeFord said, whose family members used paddles and their hands to toss as many overboard as they could. “It was very scary.”

Asian carp can grow to more than 60 pounds and jump nearly 10 feet in the air. The hum of a boat engine irritates the fish, leading them to jump out of the water.

Foutch, who spent 30 years as a paramedic, said he’s seen gruesome injuries caused by flying carp, including broken noses, lacerations and even eyewear embedded in a person’s face after being struck by the fish.

“If you can imagine water skiing at 30 miles per hour and catching a 10-pound carp in the face,” Foutch said. “It’s going to leave a mark.”

While the carp have infested the river streams leading north, lawmakers are drawing the line at the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, the last frontier before Lake Michigan.

Former Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Supreme Court in 2009 requesting that the canal be closed, but the channel serves as an important shipping passage.
Currently, electric barriers are in place to prevent the carp from reaching the lakes while still allowing

cargo ships to pass, but last month, the US Army Corps of Engineers discovered Asian carp DNA past the electronic barrier.

The corps is researching ways to handle the Asian carp problem, but a report is not scheduled to be released until 2015. According to news reports, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette said that will be too late and plans to continue the legal fight that Cox started.

While the legal gridlock ensues, DeFord has taken up her own fight against Asian carp.
In its seventh year, the Redneck Fishing Tournament founded by DeFord netted more than 9,000 carp last weekend.

More than 4,000 people from as far as Japan came to watch the tournament where participants use dip nets — instead of traditional fishing poles — to catch fish as they jump out of the water.

“I think I have done my small part in bringing attention to this issue,” DeFord said, adding that the tournament “won’t stop until the carp is gone.”

Follow Frank Bi @frankiebi.