I ate both yesterday, one by choice and one because I had to. I ate the carp by choice, and it was palatable, but the having to eat crow is never good. The Delta Wildlife held a meeting entitled “Delta Fisheries Update” . It started with presentations about the Mississippi River and how it has evolved in very recent history. In the 1930’s and early 40’s there were 16 cutoffs that reduced the length of the river 154 miles, one of the tidbits that were offered. One thing I learned was about the classification of the connections of bodies of water to the river. Lake Ferguson is a parapotanel connection, since it is always connected on one end. On the other hand the private hole is a paleopotanel connection that only connects every few years due to high water. There were other classifications but I could not write fast enough. When the river is high, the batture forests contribute to lowering the nutrient levels in the river , allowing it to thrive and not become overburdened with nutrients. There was talk of rewatering of Delta streams by pumping water from the river into Moon Lake and allowing it to flow down the Sunflower and attaching the Tallahatchie to the Quiver River to use some of the flow from the Corps flood control reservoirs in the summer to enhance low water flows.

Now comes the eating crow part. I have always thought the decline in our fisheries was caused by the flooding of green vegetation in the spring of the year and the subsequent decay of the same taking oxygen out of the water when the fish were in the shallows and it had nothing to do with the Asian carp. The data presented showed I was wrong. The carp might not be the whole effect but is a part of the problem. Presentations by Nathan Aycock of the MDWFP and Quinton Phelps of the Missouri Department of Conservation were most educational. The bighead carp and the silver carp were imported into the country in the 70’s by the government for the purpose of improving the water quality of sewerage lagoons. They are filter feeders and perfect for the job of filtering the phytoplankton from the lagoons. In a flood event in Arkansas they escaped into the White River. Arkansas fish farmers get the blame for their introduction but they were raising them for the government and it was not really their fault. The fish are very prolific in that they can lay 50,000 to 5 million eggs per year.  Spawning takes place in the summer and lasts until the middle of September. For spawning to be successful it has to occur in flowing water because their eggs will sink in still water. They reach sexual maturity in 2 to 3 years and will live from 5 to 13 years. The growth rate is 1 yr = 12 inches, 2 yr = 24 inches and 3 yr = 28 inches.  An important distinction: Silver Carp jump and the Bighead Carp do not. The bighead is larger, up to 100+ pounds, and the silver tops out at 40 to 50. The MDWFP has done electrofishing studies in Wolf Lake, Bee Lake, Little Eagle, and Belzoni Cutoff. In 2011 the carp were introduced to Bee and Wolf Lakes by the flood and were not introduced to Little Eagle and the Belzoni Cutoff. Studies showed since 2011 lower numbers of largemouth bass, bream and crappie in the carp affected lakes and also smaller average size and growth. Since the affected lakes have no moving water no reproduction has been detected, good news. The fry of the sport fish survive on phytoplankton when they first hatch so any reduction in it has to be a negative . In an experiment in Missouri, the carp had a negative effect on gizzard shad and bigmouth buffalo. The fish were put in the same tanks and fed. The shad almost all died and the buffalo lost weight while the silver carp were fine. In another Missouri electrofishing study, the carp were shown to have a very negative effect on phytoplankton, gizzard shad and bigmouth buffalo numbers.  It was found the carp are not scared to travel. One fitted with an embedded electronic chip traveled 400 miles in the Mississippi River in two weeks.

So much for eating crow, how about the carp? We had carp for lunch along with catfish. The carp was supplied by Moon River Foods of Indianola.  It was prepared by Cicero’s and was not bad. The texture and the taste was good. We also viewed a video of the carp seining operation in Lake Ferguson. It took four men to pull the net into the boat with a 12 to 15 flopping large carp in it. It was a labor and equipment intensive operation. The carp are here to stay and are damaging to out fishing.  Optimistically I want to see how the fishing in Lake Ferguson and the river lakes improve with the large number of small sport fish that are now present. I’m not ready to sell my rods and reels yet.