Lake Cumberland —  

Fisherman in and around Kentucky are finding that they have something to carp about — but what about those who use Lake Cumberland?

Asian carp — a type of fish foreign to regional waters — is becoming a serious problem. A recent article in the Louisville Courier-Journal put a spotlight on the invasive species—the fish can grow to as large as 100 pounds in size—and the dangers they present to the regional eco-system.

Silver and bighead varieties of Asian carp are being found in the Ohio River and lakes in western Kentucky, including Lake Barkley. The fish have come north from the Mississippi River, and pose a very real threat of crowding out native fish like white bass, walleye, crappie, and catfish — prime Lake Cumberland sport fish.

“Asian carp eat small plankton, the same small plankton that other small fish feed on, like young bass or young walleye,” Dave Baker, editor of popular Bluegrass nature periodical Kentucky Afield, told the Commonwealth Journal during an interview yesterday. “Asian carp are basically like big vacuum cleaners, and would sweep up a lot of the food that young sport fish need to survive. Asian carp are just bad news.”

How long would it take the Asian carp to wipe out populations of native fish? Baker, an expert in the subject of Kentucky’s waters and wildlife, wasn’t sure, and didn’t even know if that would happen.

“They could co-exist,” he said, “(but) If Asian carp got in there at a high enough concentration, it could affect growth rate of walleye and bass.”

Those are two of species of fish commonly found beneath the waters of Lake Cumberland, where thousands of fishermen come every year to cast their lines. The fish pose just another threat to the lake, which has been significantly lowered in recent years due to repair work on Wolf Creek Dam, affecting the tourism economy.

Asian carp were imported to the southern United States in the 1970s as a means to remove algae from retention ponds for fish farms and water treatment facilities. After escaping into the Mississippi River, however, the carp have been disrupting the natural habitat as far north as West Virginia.

Bighead and silver carp specifically outgrow the menus of other predators at a swift rate, and northern states are currently working on ways to try and keep the fish from coming into the Great Lakes, where biologists are concerned the foreign invaders could wreak both ecological and economic havoc.

At the moment, however, things are fine on Lake Cumberland, according to both Baker and officials with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Allison Jarrett, public affairs specialist with the Corps of Engineers said that there is not currently a problem with Asian carp in Lake Cumberland, and she noted that she wasn’t even sure if the fish would be able to get there.

“That’s because of Wolf Creek Dam,” explained Baker. “The way the dam is positioned in relation to Lake Cumberland could keep Asian carp infestation from becoming a problem here.

“The fish would have to come through the dam, and I don’t see them being able to do that,. These fish typically move from higher elevations to lower elevations. It’s very uncommon for them to go the other direction.”

The one real risk, as Baker sees it, is that young Asian carp resemble bait fish. Should a fisherman elsewhere find an Asian carp and mistake it for bait fish, he could unintentionally use it in Lake Cumberland and spread the species that way.

“That’s how they would get in there,” said Baker.

For Baker’s part, he believes it would be a shame for it to happen, given the natural spectacle that Lake Cumberland provides its visitors.

“I hope (the Asian carp) never get into Lake Cumberland, because it’s absolutely beautiful,” he said, “and it has great fishing.”

The Courier-Journal article, released by the Associated Press, states that Paul Rister, a state fisheries biologist, was skeptical of the size and number of Asian carp that were being reported in regional lakes. 

"Fishermen," he said, "like to grow their fish in their stories'."

But Rister went along with a camera, and he said he's now a believer.

"Until we went out with them, and saw all that we saw, and saw them as big as we saw, it never hit home with me," he said.

Brooks said he's been talking with representatives of lobster fishermen from Maine, who are facing a shortage of herring for bait, and working on how to ship the fish across state lines without violating rules or recommendations designed to prevent the spread of fish diseases.

"They want anywhere from 40,000 to 60,000 pounds, several times a week," Brooks said.

He said the state is also looking into reports of new commercial markets in China for the fish, and that he plans to attend a meeting this summer in Chicago with China representatives. "We are going to try to find out what's going on," he said.

A Kentucky State University researcher agrees there's potential to put Asian carp on people's plates, and insists the fish taste good.

They need a more attractive name, and some savvy marketing, said Sid Dasgupta, an associate professor and principal investigator in economics and marketing at the KSU Aquaculture Research Center.

"It is very similar to tuna," he said, adding that testing shows the meat low in toxic compounds because the fish feed at the bottom of the food chain and grow quickly, and are high heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acids if also a bit boney.

Patrice M. Charlebois, an invasive species specialist with the federally funded Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant Program, said markets exist overseas and the program is trying to develop markets at U.S. grocery stores and restaurants.

She said the fish tastes "a lot like cod," or, "sea bass without a hint of the sea. The meat is really mild." They call it silverfin in Louisiana, where chefs in a promotional effort have said it tastes something like scallops or crab.

For the Ohio River, whose native fish have rebounded in recent decades with cleaner water, much is at stake. Biologists say there are few options other than establishing a commercial market to help keep their numbers from swelling and taking over.

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The Associated Press contributed to this story.