Water We Doing?

Deep Dive: Kevin Irons, Assistant Chief of Fisheries, Illinois Department of Natural Resources

April 07, 2021 David Evans / Kevin Irons Season 1 Episode 4
Water We Doing?
Deep Dive: Kevin Irons, Assistant Chief of Fisheries, Illinois Department of Natural Resources
Show Notes Transcript

Invasive species are a huge problem around the world. Asian Carp are most well known for flying through the air, striking anyone out for a pleasure cruise on the river, but they have completely changed the ecology and ecosystems they have taken over. They have taken over the Mississippi river and they are headed for the Great Lakes and Canadian Waters!

What are we doing to stop them?

In this episode you will hear from the experts about why Asian Carp were brought to the United States, how they escaped, why they are flourishing and what we are doing to limit their spread.

You will hear from Andrew Reeves, Author of the book "Overrun: Dispatches from the Asian Carp Crisis", Kevin Irons, Assistant Chief of the Fisheries Division from Illinois Department of Natural Resources, who runs the fishing program to keep asian carp away from the Great Lakes, and from Chuck Shea, US ARMY Corps of Engineers who man the underwater electric barricades keeping fish from the Mississippi river basin out of the Great Lakes.

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David Evans:

Hi, and welcome to today's deep dive episode, we're talking with Kevin irons. Today, he is the Assistant Chief of the fisheries division, the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, we're going to be talking about Asian carp and other invasive species in our waterways. And what Kevin and his team are doing to make sure that Asian carp are controlled in the Illinois River as they are getting closer and closer to the Great Lakes, and how we can make sure that they don't get into Canada. So sit back, relax and get ready for an awesome conversation about Asian carp. And what are we doing to deal with them? Why water we doing? And how can we do better? your one stop shop for everything water related from discussing water to use and the organisms that depend on it for all the global issues that you really never knew all had to do with water. I'm your host, David Evans from the aquatic biosphere project. And I just want to ask you something. What are we doing? How can we do better? Hi, I'd like to introduce my new guest for today's episode, Kevin irons. And, Kevin, do you mind just telling us a little bit about yourself and and what you do?

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

I'm glad to David. I'm the assistant fisheries chief for Illinois Department of Natural Resources. That's the division of fisheries. Of course, we were managing fishing and fisheries statewide. Over the last 10 years however, I've been the aquatic nuisance species program manager for those non native fish across the state supporting policy responses as necessary for for fish and plants and snails, aquatic critters. Prior to that, I was a research ecologist for the University of Illinois, Illinois River Biological Station. So spent quite a bit of time 20 years approximately, on the Illinois River looking at fish communities. And over that 20 years Oh, yeah, over that 20 years from the 90s 2000s. Asian carp came to the forefront. And of course, I became familiar with those. Probably it's probably good to introduce Asian carp at the same time because often people hear that moniker and I think, Oh, I know what an Asian carp is grandpa used to catch Asian carp, you know, common carp or Johnny Appleseed all across North America and the early or, frankly, the late 1880s 1890s. So they've been around for a while. Asian carps species of bighead carp, silver carp, grass carp and black copper brought in in the 1960s 70s and 80s. To sound to solve some ecological problems. So for different species, they all have little different niche. Generally, when you see Asian carps, we're talking about the big headed silver carp. The silver carp is the ones known to jump out of the water and hit people and jump over boats and do all those crazy things. But but there are four species so we'll just be really careful. Be as careful as I can generally talking about bighead and silver carp today.

David Evans:

Yeah, it's I think it's something that there's actually four species and they're kind of generalized a lot is just Asian carp as being these kind of monsters that lurk in the deeps, but they're four different species. They all have different roles and an ecosystem or niches and ways that they exploit ecosystems. What was your first introduction to Asian carp? And when did you really start to think that they might become a problem and that they'd become a nuisance species for for the Illinois area?

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

Sure. So I came to Illinois, from Ohio in 1991. As a river ecologist working on the river, noting all the species about 115 different species on the Illinois River we regularly would collect about 80 of them annually in multiple gears as part of a long term monitoring program that's on the illinois and mississippi river and very unique being will track those things through time whether it's a mineral species like an emerald shiner or invasive or non native species like common carp or goldfish or sport fish like bass or bluegill or crappie those were all caught by these various gears but when i came out in the 91 there was a story of a commercial fisherman and we always talk with with a smile when we talk about our commercial fishermen but he drugged this fish into our building dripping blood off the tail what is this so this is about six months before i came and it was one of the first big head carp caught in illinois in 1986 two had been caught one in the ohio river one on the illinois river so this is a few years later but still pretty rare event and the fishermen who spent his life out there yeah no idea what this fish looks like if you can imagine silvery salmon looking fish with the head upside down just that really rises what a big head or silver cup looks like and in this case it was a big head carp i didn't think we didn't catch another one yeah we didn't catch another one for i think four years so that was 91 we caught our first as part of a monitoring group you know we caught you know a million fish a year sometimes fishing from june through october so they're extremely rare we caught our first big head carp in 95 i think silver carp was in 98 but really just onesies and twosies until 2000 until they reproduced and that's really when when the light went off for me is we went from just getting a few and fishermen had started catching more of them but all of a sudden in 2000 there's a reproductive event and we caught 1000s of these big head carp that had reproduced for the first time that we knew on the illinois river so went from this thing that commercial fishermen were worried about because they were catching winter nets so now something is now it's an all the different types of gears all life stages that reproducing and it became really real at that point

David Evans:

yeah once it became real and i mean we'll get into it but like the the implications that that really has for the ecosystems in general but it seems fascinating to me that they can just explode in numbers so quickly and they do seem to be able to take over and that leads me to my next question of how has this invasion of asian carp impacted waterways in the state of illinois

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

it's strange so because i was in a position i was able to actually look at some biological evidence through the 90s kind of queuing this up is like what could the interaction be biologically with other fishes with other things in the water and so we looked at those things that ate very similar food you know so these are playing timorous fish they're eating plankton zol plankton the small animals in the water and the small plants the phytoplankton so they're eating these things that are generally green in the water what else he sells gizzard shad which is a forage species on the illinois river and a big mouth buffalo which is a sucker kind of stohlman that also feeds primarily on zooplankton most of its life so started looking at though just actually collecting data what if something would go on and over a period of just a few years and we published about 2007 it was really clear gizzard shad buffalo are thinner after asian carp became prevalent than before remember we're working on his long term data set you know it's a very valuable tool so we had data yeah for carper were really prevalent and and that was one of the first statements really in north america maybe even in the world biologically these wild systems that we saw this impact that bighead and silver carp could have the other is obvious in the 1990s we had very strong bass fishing tournaments on the illinois river so we have a boat moving 60 plus miles an hour down the river it's it's known for its waterfowl and occasional seeing occasional skiing these are these are river systems Typical crystal clear legs. But nonetheless, all recreation now has to consider what happens if a six or 10 pound fish jumps out of the water right in front of me, whether I'm on the boat being pulled by a boat, I'm recreating moving really fast, it will have to think twice. I even recall a few, at least in the early days, outdoor adventures, which you know, it'd be a Jon boat with trashcan lids and a couple folding chairs to take people out. Because those silver carps, those numbers were growing as well. And they get in this area, and the fish would jump. And you can kind of predict, maybe when the water goes a little bit shallow or maybe there's brush in the water that you could make the fish jump at certain locations. So a good air quote guide, could take you to a location puts you there and have a fissure to jump in or hit your trash can lids. And so there were people doing that and risk was real people could get hit. And there were always those stories of somebody getting killed. You know, there's, you know, we do lose a duck hunter occasionally. On river and you know, wow, you have to think was that now efficient? Hit the person out of the boat, or did he hit a log? Something? You know, I have to tell recreational water users you have to have a lifejacket on. You don't know where the threat is coming from? you slow down. Yeah, exactly. jump from the boat, and it's gonna do some damage of the hits. Yeah.

David Evans:

Yeah, just having that extra unknown threat. I mean, you can, I've seen the videos and a lot of them are just, they treat it as almost a funny thing. And the more you watch it, the more it gets scary, like these fish are huge, and they are just flying out and it really is a big risk of being on those waterways and decreases enjoyment of those areas. What's really led to Asian carp doing so well in these areas, and how big can they actually get?

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

Sure, great question. First, these are large river fish. They're from Asia, Asia, countries in Asia. They're Chinese, the famous aquaculture fish of China that they can grow together in very close quarters they're eating this plankton mix. And you know, you can they grow so fast, you can harvest them. So one of the most cultured fish in the world, we call it the Kennedy they have high fecundity of many eggs. Okay, one one fish. Maybe a 40 pound fish will have 4 million eggs. And a big head carp can get over Hylian. 4 million at one female Wow. So doesn't take too many to get to that point where you're now reproducing. And now if you have a lot of them are reproducing, they can saturate the environment. They're very unique that they reproduce in the flowing water very few of our fish that we often think about spawning fish like their bath and our blue gills who have to go into the back waters are non flowing area that make a bed or even like a salmon making a red they they deposit their eggs in a very precise location. Well, these are broadcast spawners, they meet in conjugations of many fish in the middle of very turbid flowing water. Maybe when we're Island comes together or below a lock and dam. Where does all this turbulence, and the female frankly turns upside down and the male's surround her and she'll release her eggs and the male's release their sperm and boom, you've got eggs that are fertilized and they're flowing downstream, and they'll float for days, maybe 48 hours before they become small larval fish. And then those larval fish can't really swim out of the current for another half a day all depending on temperature. So these rivers which have to flow fairly good for this to happen. Now the fish can be hundreds of miles away from the adults where the adults spawn and eventually those larval fish they can get out of the current flow back to the calmer waters. Where that plankton is prevalent, and they can go to the they go to the shallow areas where they can hide from predators, right, these are minnows, we often think of minerals being small. Again, they get carp we get 100 pounds, but these are minerals without spines. And so it means everything in in the river can eat them. So they there they do very good in their inner life history to go downstream. And then get out of the current and try to get back into places where they can be protected and grow. And they grow very quickly. When they first reproduced in 2000, on our Illinois River, we had good numbers of fish. It didn't take very many of them to have a lot of fish. But they got to probably 15 to 18 inches, the end of that first summer, so maybe spawned in June, there were 15 inches, maybe two pounds already. They grew incredibly fast. Wow.

David Evans:

That's crazy. That's so fast.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

They didn't have any competition from other carps, and only the competition from our native, like timorous fish, and recognizing that all fishermen are small he plankton. Today, those fish may only get six inches long. At the end of one year, maybe not even that long, depending on what time of the year they were. They respond, but there's so many Asian carp mouths out there to feed today that there's less Yeah, all the food per individual. So they're growing much slower today and their dinner today. Just like we saw gizzard shad and buffalo being thinner. In the 2000s. We even see Asian carp today being somewhat thinner and slower growing. Hmm.

David Evans:

So would you say that they're almost reaching a new equilibrium in the ecosystem then, or they're starting to kind of get down in size.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

It's something we're least I've thought about often. And the one thing is we don't have consistent spawning. Because it takes a little bit of a flood on the Illinois River, we don't have spawning every year, maybe the Missouri River because it's it's much wider, much larger watershed that have large flows every year and be faster flows will spawn all the time. But on the Illinois River, we don't see that. So we do see good spawns every three or four years, and we have a couple of good years and then a few. So a little bit of ebb and flow, almost a sine wave of peak densities and not so peak, and it's kind of up and down. And we do have harvest, we have you know, when they're small up against that six inches or so they can baby that upon by birds and other fish. Right. So depending on how when do they get to that one pound size, when can they get beyond some of the predation. So it's a very complicated web. But I think there is a new equilibrium. And it's not a clear, total abundance. But we do see maybe 60 70% of the total biomass out there today, being Asian carp. But I think also it's filling what I think is an empty niche, because I think of the total biomass and this is maybe more speculation, the actual data. I think the total biomass out in our rivers might be higher with Asian Cup today than what it would have been without Asian carp 30 years ago. It's something to think about, and I'm sure our ecologists can can click on that more I've kind of gotten out of the ability to spend time on those questions, but but the biomass out there is extremely high, we haven't lost all the other species, their numbers can be down some fish are doing well. Cat fish in particular, are seem to be doing as good or better. In the presence of carp, whether they're feeding on them, or just where they're spending most of their time or less interacting with the food web of carp. Things like shad and buffalo are more dynamic. There is evidence our other sport fish like bass and bluegill and crappie are being affected because Lisa, times during their life, they're in competition for food. And other times, they could take advantage of carpus food. So sometimes the effects aren't crystal.

David Evans:

Yeah. When you get into ecology, everything has so many different interactions. It's really, it's really difficult to have a cause and effect. I guess the most obvious one here is the cause and effect would be introducing the car but even then it's still the water is still pretty muddy when it comes to try to figure it out.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

Yeah, very good. Very well said that. That is clear. You know. And one thing I skipped over, is we go back to Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. And we talked about in I think that was in the late 50s, early 60s. She started talking about the humans, using more chemicals on the landscape, and killing off the insects and the frogs and things like that. this is really an answer to that concern because we can now bring something in he plankton something is basically causing pollution in our catfish ponds in the southern us clean the water without throwing some type of chemical on there to control the algae bloom and you'd have a product a fish product for food for fertilizers that the canned to make a protein powder out of you know this is what the rest of the world was doing so why wouldn't you do this so made a lot of sense and it was clear there were biologists on both sides of this argument whether to do it or not but i think it's interesting at epa fish and wildlife service we're all supporting this because it was a way we could do this without killing off our native environment without killing the frogs and the insects exactly to that point so he gets a bad rap and i'm not trying to say i love asian carp but we do need to make sure we don't make these mistakes again so you have to understand the story that they're brought over for pretty noble purposes to clean water provide food but they got out of the barn and expanded throughout the waterways

David Evans:

it's such a fascinating story of the reasons they were brought here yeah as you're saying noble reasons when you try to do everything right but maybe you just don't have enough time to to look at every possible scenario you mentioned earlier that one fish that weighed i think he said 40 pounds could have 4 million eggs is that does that increase as they get larger

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

it does it does that's you know at some point they there's a there's a curve there well that number will fall off but you can see fish and they're pretty rare once you get over 80 pounds but the end these large fish are a

Unknown:

huge fish

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

and they get there surprisingly quickly and they just eat like a bailey whale or even the smallest type of food sources out there so yeah it's easy to see that a fish can have more than 4 million eggs can approach eight or 10 million eggs at a time and these fish are so unique that if there are three flood peaks throughout a year either an individual fish or a cohort a group of fishes may spawn at the first peak during the windows when the temperatures are appropriate or may spawn over several or one of those subsequent peaks so not all of them will necessarily spawn at the same time so they take they're really great invaders and in this case where they can take advantage of variable environment and watersheds we see them the way they act on the illinois river is somewhat different when i talk to my colleagues on the missouri river or the ohio river or the southern mississippi river they may be working just a little bit different in those systems

David Evans:

interesting how how are they acting differently than those systems

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

yes specifically when it comes to reproductive capacity it seems like when the temperatures are right on the missouri river there's always eggs in the system so someone's always trying to spawn everything's there the illinois river is a very slow lazy river this is an ancient mississippi river basin for the lower two thirds of the river which means it's an extremely wide floodplain very shallow slow gradient for what is now much smaller river the illinois and so most of the year we don't have those the the flows that would would trigger a spawn so it takes these spring fresh rain events and they're pretty variable we might see in in april that's a little too early so the fish may not be able to take advantage of it but if it happens then again in july the fish can respond but it can't just happen in a day it has to be a long fairly drawn out increase in the flood and it takes and this is again a touchy feely type of thing but we can see it in the hormone data's of the fish and spawning them is it takes them a while it might take them 10 days from where those waters are rising and they kind of sense the mud and water the algae blooms the flows picking up and all sudden they can take advantage of that so they i mean they grew up taking advantage of the yangtze river in china which was 4000 miles long and historically they've been fished and studied for 1000s of years because it feeds lots of people and there are areas of Have that river that are known for more like like, and any adults can live in the lake just fine. It's lots of plankton and they can take advantage of that. But then when they spawn, they have to go back to the current. And then the eggs will drift down and actually, below Three Gorges Dam is where those eggs in very general terms would get to the point of being larval fish. And and now below that three gorgeous area of the river was a myriad of backwaters where those larvae, fish historically would go into those places. Now, the x river like all other rivers have been highly altered. These dams been put in, there's levees off of these backwaters, and in those places to Asian carp, are having a problem reproducing, they can't get to all places where their life stages have to get. In fact, I think last year, China closed their fishing on the Yangtze River for for all fish, but you know, just fish like big headed several carp could not complete their life cycles because of all these effects of humans. Now the thing that China has is they've got so much aquaculture, flooded, maintain, you know, agriculture farming going on, that they have significant production going on outside of the rivers as well today.

David Evans:

That's really interesting, because it seems like the inverse problem of Asian carp are a threat to ecosystems throughout the Mississippi basin. But yet, when they're home range in China, due to human interactions, they're starting to struggle. Right,

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

right. Yeah, I was just gonna build on that. David, you're absolutely right. So we have a very unique and very healthy relationship with some Chinese researchers. They're trying to support a vibrant fishery and get their fisheries back in their large rivers, and they've got challenges and but understanding what, what's going on here. They don't understand the challenge of too many fish doesn't make any sense to them. Why is this a problem? If you've had Asian carp to eat, and it's done, right, these things are delicious, because the plankton they have a delicious white flaky meat, they're they're bony. At the same time, the Chinese are watching us, we can look back at them and say, Well, why don't you have a carp problem there is because of sustained high levels of harvests over a long period of time. They do use things like locks and dams. Let's call it a deterrent. Right? Does that make sense for us to do it, and we're using some of these things here, appropriate placement of those, if we can do it ecologically responsibly, right, we're trying to protect our native fish, we have to keep that in mind. First and foremost, you can't just stop all the carp and kill all the other fish pathways as well. So I have to remind my colleagues, we have to consider all of this at the same time, otherwise, we just create another problem. But then there's other technology, you know, electricity and sound. In the Yangtze River, they have at least had two freshwater dolphins. One did get over fished. I think accidentally, not intentionally, but they still maintain a freshwater dolphin. So you've got those predators can do something different than, than what just large fish can do so. So having had back and forth, actually, we've learned how to fish these fish better by traveling to China, and observing how they're doing it, talk to their fishermen. And I don't speak the language. But you get two fishermen in a room and someone's got to tell a story. And we learned enough to figure out, they have what they use a unified method, they'll fish a lake over a month or two month period of time to catch over 80 90% of all the fish and like, because we're taking them to market. We've been able to do that here. And we can catch over 80% of Asian carp in much smaller bodies of water in a couple weeks. So we've been able to deploy that and use it in places where we're more efficient at harvest is one of our strategies to help protect and prevent their spread. Yeah, that's

David Evans:

super interesting that Yeah, you can really target those species. But I guess my question is, what are some of the methods that you're using so that you're making sure you're targeting those Asian carp, but maybe not targeting the native species at the same time? And also, just to add on to that, are you looking at bringing dolphins into the Illinois River to help with the Asian carp

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

Problem broadly dolphins know, I can't imagine the ecological I had to ask no one would have to think it. Be curious, right? We have never had that. South America has a freshwater dolphin as well. And why don't we? It'd be very unique. But it'd be a challenge for biologists and fishermen to have a freshwater mammal, I think they just go into a different level of care. Wow. So I don't think that's going to be on there. But that point is, is increasing mortality is something that we can do to change the population. So how do we increase mortality? You know, yes, you can stack more predators. And you can broadly Think about that. Do we need more predators, I river really has lots of predators. Whether it's white bass, a small mouth bass, a large mouth bass or catfish, pelicans, we have huge groups of pelicans that are fish eating birds that come through annually. So we have predation. But how do we increase it even more? And how do you get those big fish out, because once again, once you get to that certain size, even a pelican might take a one or two pound fish, but after that, it's very difficult. So fishing has been identified as something that we can target these big fish and be very effective. Because and I think we've already talked about it in several ways. These are the largest fish out there in the water, they grow very quickly. We don't have other we don't have many of these other large fish out there. ones over, you know, 510 20 pounds are just not that prevalent. So we can target them with things like gill nets and travel nets. We can use large stains and sort fish. You know, if you bring them to the beach, and they're all alive, you can you can form good fisherman fish, but really in a gill net fishery, which is you know, one of the most common ways of fishing around the world. We do very well probably over 80% of all the fish we capture are Asian carp. If you look at our total landings, maybe 2% are sport fish. And the biggest bycatch is small mouth Buffalo, which is a native soccer. Hmm, but those fish can go right back into the water brought into the boat taken out of the net put back in the water, with nearly zero impacts. We're not killing those fish, we're not harvesting those fish, we have the ability to sort identify and throw them back. So we're harvesting currently in the upper Illinois River as it gets closer to Lake Michigan, there's not at large commercial fishing. So we have a team of 10 commercial fishermen that work for our agency. And we fish from February through December, we took 1.3 million pounds out last year, even with the COVID protocols and all the challenges that brought we've had over 1.5 million pounds. We have seen changes in the densities of fish at that leading edge drop, almost 97% from sustained harvest in those upper walls of the Illinois River. And more and more evidence is telling us from modeling, that if we can go farther down and we're actually commercial fishing exists in the Promote, harvest more, basically increasing mortality of those fish farther down on a river, we can do even better. So we're now working with commercial fishermen try to figure out how do we get more of these fish out? Because we're taking a million pounds out they're taking three to 10 million pounds out so can we double triple their productivity for our management benefit and with a guess we can

David Evans:

that's awesome with collecting and removing this huge amount of fish. I guess we haven't really touched on this yet. But the Illinois River is is kind of the leading edge of this invasion as it moves further and further into the extended reaches of the Mississippi basin. As I understand it, and it's it's getting close to the Great Lakes as you're trying to protect the native species in your waterways. There still is so many other areas within the Mississippi River and other tributaries that can lead back into the Illinois so Does it almost feel like you're you're trying to plug one hole, but then there's a lot of different other leaks as well and there's always going to be an endless supply unless there's a coordinated effort or does it feel that you're making an impact on on the species.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

It really feels like we're making them back. You know, things are flowing from North, the South and the Mississippi River in general. The Illinois River is just one major tributary, and it does connect with the Great Lakes. And that's why it's our our focus in Illinois right now is that, yes, we have them in the Mississippi River near St. Louis. And they're been found all the way up into Minnesota waters. Above some of these locks and dams, though, it has slowed. We don't see fish raising up there. And these huge numbers kiak, I was about halfway up the Mississippi River. And there's a kind of a natural barrier, there's one lock and dam there, where they only can fish in general can only move through the lock. And it's noted there. But for all the concerns you might have is that we don't see skipjack herring, and the mussel species that host prevalent upstream of lock and dam 90, but it's also a funnel, a pinch point for Asian carp. And we do have some Asian carp reproducing upstream of there. But we are also looking at some information from USGS and other researchers about putting a sound in the lock. What if we had a sound whether it's Def Leppard, or Beethoven's Fifth that the carp says, I don't like that I'm not going in that lock for nothing. So a lot of that work is being conducted over next few years to Can we do that and allow the native fish to go up there? Or can we otherwise mitigate for those native fish losses? They can't go through the lock. So we're asking the right questions we've got concluded yet. On the Illinois River, we've got a series of, of controls already in place, I talked about fishing. And that's just one part of it. So the two goals are one, prevent the spread, and these new systems are being hidden silver carp are not present. And then two, can we reduce the impacts to our native fish, where they're where they are very present. So yes, we can see that and we have some work to do, but it's helpful. The harvest is preventing their spread. And it's reducing their overall density. So that's answering that objective to and helping to prevent their spread. But we also have three electric barriers, think of a cattle fence. And in in prairie country of Canada, we use electric fences to say you can go here but don't go there. There are three repetitive barriers in Chicago to prevent fish in general, we think it's effective on any fish.

David Evans:

I think this is so

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

cool to prevent their spread. And they're always on and there's their maintenance intensive. They're always doing something but the US Army Corps of Engineers operates that where the canal has been built 30 feet deep, 160 foot wide at this point. But essentially, fish would have to swim through this location to get to the Great Lakes, and there are at least three barriers there. So they're constantly working on that to make it better, they're actually going to be working on turning one on. That's can be twice as strong with the electric field if needed, if something changes if it has a risk. Thankfully, we've only ever caught one fish at or even close to the barrier. We have caught two fish upstream of the barrier in 10 years one and 2010 and one in 2017, a silver carpet 17 of bighead carp and 2010 how they got through there. They physically could not have swam through the electric barrier at that size. But were they carried either by a boat or a person pushing older drug did have help. They had to have help to get around it. But there's no char marks, there's no there's no evidence we've done the post mortems on these and we've looked at investigated it and it tells us list the most recent silver carp It was probably below the electric barrier for a while. And then we found it in just a few weeks or months. So we have other monitoring in place, we able to detect a rare fish very quickly, which gives us confidence that we're we don't have fish running into the Great Lakes currently.

David Evans:

That's awesome. That's great news.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

It is great news. We really we don't want these in the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes are very special to US and Canada. And we do a lot of recreation. There's a lot of drinking water, and it connects some big systems. And we do want to keep them out.

David Evans:

Yeah, exactly. And I guess the next question is, has there been any detection in the Great Lakes So you mentioned that there has been some pasties buried And it's it's, it's confusing and but it's not a huge issue. These barriers are keeping any fish from passing through, but has there been any detection at all in the Great Lakes.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

So this is where the definition of Asian carp is very important. So if we talk about big head carp, they get a silver carp. So the ones we're generally talking about these fish that are jumping and flailing and growing and so dense and moving towards the Great Lakes, and and in fact, at least three big head carp have been found in Lake Erie between Toronto and Toledo. And those waters are very large fish. They'd been out in the water for some time. And if you think about how they're used, at least originally, so these were around 2000, let's say, but they were they were growing up with catfish. And then there was cultural markets, like Toronto, Cleveland, Toledo, are alive. bighead carp would have been desired for wedding feast and cultural purposes. So there was live markets that you could buy them live now. Did someone buy a car, like and you're having a big wedding feast? And the wife said, Nope, we're having spaghetti. And they threw the fish in the water or was there a cultural practice of releasing a fish? Some people have talked about, you know, maybe you set one free and got some religious credits for for doing that. It's not really there are some of those practices going on whether it happened with bighead carp? We're, we think it probably did. We just can't tell how those three bighead carp got in there. What we do know in Illinois, we found bighead carp and catfish ponds. People would hire people to bring up catfish from southern states and stock them throughout the Chicago region. So people could catch fish with our urban fishing program. Did that happen in Cleveland? That happened other places, maybe Detroit as well. There's a couple of real ways. A fish hauler could have intentionally for food or unintentionally as a contaminant with catfish brought fish to the Midwest. So there's a long answer, but three bighead carp were found some time ago, 20 plus years ago, in Lake Erie, and we've not seen any big head carp

David Evans:

since that is absolutely fascinating.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

Yep, grass carp is an Asian carp and it has to be considered as an Asian carp for these four species in North America, and there are some other Asian carp species that we don't have in North America, and we're not even talking about but grass carp are found in Lake Erie. And they have been found to be reproducing in tributaries of like Erie. And that's unfortunate. And Illinois has not tested Lake Erie, so I don't want to spend too much time talking about it. But nonetheless, they have found their way their grass carp have been used throughout the country to control aquatic vegetation to be a non chemical control some nuisance vegetation, as well as making its way into human food supplies. Live food markets. Today, many states and provinces do not allow live Asian carp regardless of species, including grass carp, but right. So, again, depending on your definition, but I'm not aware of any black carp in the Great Lakes, nor any silver carp that have been caught in the Great Lakes, but let's release three adult bighead carp in that anything recent and then Asian carp is currently being grass carp.

David Evans:

That's really fascinating to hear. Yeah, the distinction between bighead grass, silver and black as well. I just want to I also want to be cognizant of your time too, because I know that it's kind of the end of the meeting that we had scheduled. Is it okay to continue on with some more questions? Or should we Yeah,

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

and just tell me that stop talking. You know, it is fascinating. I'm very lucky to have a career that I've been able to be the researcher and really then worked into the state administration and program and I think we're making a difference. So I'm very proud of what we're doing. So I don't mind talking about it, but I can shorten some answer. So no, I

David Evans:

keep them long. I'm enjoying this so much. Awesome. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't getting in the way of something else in your that you're working on here. But no, I really appreciate your time. And I'm I'm thrilled to be chatting with you and learning because this is absolutely absolutely fascinating and super important work that you guys are that your team is doing and I'm yeah, I'm just want to help that promote what you guys are doing and then and then spread the word i

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

appreciate it david is one of my honors to spread this news because i think it is something that we're all challenged with how to deal with missing species and i've been able to go to china and learn and and i've been given the ability to talk to many states and provinces of quebec and ontario to figure out how to best manage this as a group and so this is one of the things we can rally around so the sharing of information and strategies is really important yeah

David Evans:

i think especially in a time when canada us and china relations aren't always at their peak let's say it's things like this and issues that we can all understand and relate to and work together on that are really important and really highlight how we were really connected to these ecosystems and lands and how we should really value

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

people or people wherever you go and any it's really hard i'm not a political person but it's really hard to separate the politics from the work that everybody's so devoted to and and there are great scientists frankly i did work with some central government people in china and they were a joy to deal with you know we we didn't have any issues that we were in conflict with and this may or may not be appropriate for the group but you can't just shut down a whole fishery that's 4000 miles long in north america overnight but they could do it in china or communist country and they know that i mean he kind of you know would smile you know we can do that you know they can repurpose the the workers in a much different way than we can do it in north america maybe yep you're gonna be farming navel oranges right now but good i guess good for them yeah but i i can't say that i had any bad experience with the people and i only learned so much for our benefit

David Evans:

yeah exactly people are people are people everywhere and we're all just trying to do it for what we're working on

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

i'll give you an anecdote we were taken to an aquaculture farm a huge like 10s of 1000s of acres they showed us these unified methods well i hate to call it a fishing village but there were several houses there and one building we were allowed to come over actually fish one of their ponds for a little bit and had their garden and time in a fall it was well worked over except for about three rows of peppers like black kinda like tabasco type pepper black and beautiful lucky peppers and just their branches were full but everything else that cabbages bok choy and everything else was pretty well picked over and a commercial fishermen that i brought from a little while dr pepper is sure that pepper lit him up there's a reason that there was all those different branches he just tongue and he just bought wept and just stick it out no matter where you are people may not be new those things are just kind of funny

Unknown:

they knew it

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

they did for dave

David Evans:

that's awesome yeah you're always gonna have someone who comes in and just says let's try that let's try that just goes right for it sure it's usually me and i just end up weeping so what do you think is the future for asian carp in north america if you had a crystal ball and could look into the future about 20 years or 30 years what do you think we would be like

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

that's a great question because i hear a lot of people debating this you know how do we kill them all and what's the silver bullet and i think as a part of the mineral family being a middle family being one of the largest family of fishes in the world i think they're here i think they'll be here for a while but i think there are things that we can do to reduce our impacts and prevent their spread i think we can be successful keeping them out of the great lakes and we're putting a lot of effort to that end and i think we can prevent them from getting into some of these other places with good policy in illinois we have a beer hero transport zero policy so we got to educate people don't free willy at the side of your lake when you're done with your minnows you're thrown in the trash you're thrown out up the seagulls on the grass you don't move bait fish around with that being said i think also looking at these fish what they are very fast growing high quality protein there's apple opportunities especially with COVID where protein is needed our food supplies been compromised and there are challenges there we have the ability to use a novel something new and really we don't want it in the river and we can take the people who might be hungry and and give them an opportunity to have something high in omega threes low and contaminants and it's going to compare very favorably to tuna pond res catfish when it comes to contaminants so i think developing this industry they can also provide jobs in these river corridors in in the us these river corridors are some of the most impoverished places in our country from from illinois parts of mississippi river south in new orleans you got the lower missouri lower ohio the jobs i mean historically these are where everybody wanted to be back in the steam boats and that's where all these cities were trapping and hunting that's not the case anymore there are a lot of poor people and we can bring a skill set of fishing shipping your cargo and wrap this up and start feeding people and i think some can't be ignored and we're actually having great success in bringing some of these fish products just a simple ground product that can help people deal with the bones of these fish think of it like a sausage what they call a chump pack that you might get at the grocery store what if this was a fish that was flavored like taco meat so you brought it home you put it in the pan you fried it up and you build a taco these fish are so mild you can make a flavor whatever your palate is like generally north americans us fish eaters don't want a fishy tasting fish they want one is bland this fish fits the bill that's what this fish is it can be too mild at times and so there's good hope for finding that and helping that be the tool to not get rid of all the fish you can't it's really hard to fish something to zero but i think it's access and i think that's where the question started that success is having 20% of the biomass being asian carp and that 70% of the biomass in those places where they're so abundant that might mean a lot of places never see a car and so i think that's what what i would hope and 10 or 20 years is at the low abundances you know we can return to doing some of the recreational activities you're not getting hit every day it'll be part of the system there'll be something that we're taking advantage of to our benefit instead of the fish taking advantage of it for theirs

David Evans:

yeah i think that that is exactly right like if life gives you lemons then you've got to make lemonade and nad maybe it's it's fish tacos or something like that at some point it's unrealistic to expect to get rid of this and go back to how it was before it's almost an irreversible changes at least being able to help protect native species and also get some benefit out of it especially as you were pointing out during COVID there's hunger is a real thing and and people are hurting right now and this might be a pivot point for this industry to to kick off do you think there's anything that is really holding it back other than the like kind of the bony texture or if someone who was listening to this podcast and was like i want to i want to try this how can i get my hands on some asian carp for dinner tonight what's the next step

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

we're getting really close so it's a chicken and egg thing you can't create this thing overnight these waters 100 years ago turn of the century were some of the best commercial fishing programs in the country of north raleigh north america i'll say the us because in the us it was the the great lakes it was the columbia river in the illinois river responsible for the bulk of commercial fishing that found restaurants and and fish markets and everything all across the country so in canada you're a little bit more broad with first nations and some of the other indigenous fishing that was going on but but certainly in the us late 1800s the omo river was there so it's gonna take a while to build up that infrastructure most of our fishing infrastructure as with canada is built towards our coasts these big freighters bring in efficient processes in real time So this is a little different system. And it may not be ever as big as some of those Pollak fisheries or some of the white fish off West, but I think it takes some time and right people and I think we have those people so if someone wanted to try Asian carp, I think our I fish illinois.org website will help get people to that location very soon. We have people interested. Awesome. carp, unfortunately is a four letter word. Remember common carp are brought over by our European ancestors and in the 1880s. common carp are bottom feeders. They eat down in water column eat the vegetation down in the vegetation and mud picking up invertebrates and their flesh can be stronger than most. Is that bad? I've had good common carp, but carps a four letter word. And people recognize carps, a four letter word if you say it, they wrinkle their nose carp. So there may be ways we can talk about Asian carp and change that perspective, whether it's a brand or just being consistent and talking about it. I would expect something mid summer to help get us over the carp phobia. And we're working with some really keen people as far as marketing and branding. To make that happen. We had a big carp, Asian carp cookoff in October, from Chicago to nearly Taro in Illinois, and is highly successful people try it, they always like it. So so we have a lot of promise and but you did mention it takes fishermen, it takes processors, it takes someone driving a truck. Currently the market is it. Frankly, the fishermen for last 10 years have been their own logistics, you know, they'll catch fish, they'll truck them in their boats, behind their pickup trucks three or four hours to someone who can take it and process it. So you can see, number one, quality is not there. The fishermen are now truck drivers. So we feel that this is starting to come together fishermen can fish truck drivers can drive trucks. let's address the quality control make sure we have the highest quality. And we can bring that tool again fishermen being the biggest tool that can start changing the populations in our rivers to meet those two goals are preventing their spread reducing their abundance. So that will start in earnest and we've been eating them here in the US for a long time, I'm sure and Toronto markets you can still find filets of bighead carp. We think some other products we call value added products can help us I've had some hotdogs made out of carp five or 10 years ago, that were just as good as any any proteins protein. So you can grind it up. And it's not. It's not like you're eating dog. It was a hot dog. That was a startup as a local company. I would say it was 90%. There, it wasn't ready for primetime. But it will not surprise me. If the hot dog doesn't win this battle, it would not surprise me, we actually serve them as corn dogs at our state fair. Everybody

David Evans:

loved them. Amazing. Well, that's so good to hear. And I think that's such a promising and such a positive thing to come from this. I'll definitely post some things in the show notes for this podcast are links where people can go and to learn more about this and where they can find some of these products. And I'm excited to learn more as in the summer, more news comes out. And as this industry begins to really grow,

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

there's a lot to talk about. And if you if you do your products, right, you're gonna have secondary products, you'll you'll have some pet feeds, and there's a Canadian company making some pet food out of Asian carp. But you can also make fertilizers right because you take your premium cuts, and then everything else. When you go into a Chinese plant, nothing comes out of there besides product. We're working with the Iceland ocean cluster, who said you know a card is not worth just $12 a card is worth $2,000 or 12 $100 because you can take everything out. This is gonna be leather, this is going to be a pharmaceutical and we're going to use the liver for this and so if you take every possible piece of value out of there now it's not As the $5 fish, now the fishermen can actually get paid what they need to do what they have to provide ice and quality. And everything else just falls in place. It takes a little while. But we've got that type of thinking going on today.

David Evans:

Yep, that's exactly where we need to be. I'm curious, what do you think is the most under told story of the Asian carp invasion?

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

Well, we kind of talked about a couple different issues. I mean, the one is, is that this, this leading edge is getting closer, and it's inevitable, they're going to get to the Great Lakes. And I think we're actually have turned the tide, and it's the opposite. We see fewer fish at that leading edge, we have more tools. Over the last 10 years, we've learned so much. We don't need to operate in the information vacuum, we actually have data that can tell us what's going on. And I spent a lot of time telling people like, you know, the sky is not falling, we have some really good things in places already. We actually have a partnership with the state of Michigan. And Illinois has partnered with the Army Corps of Engineers to work on a project pre engineering and design work for a project at Brandon road, locking down another line of defense to make sure nothing gets into the Great Lakes, as those are engineering solutions. And we'll call them defense. Right. And the other thing is we're talking about harvest and picking a fight to the fish and removing them. That's offense. So so we're developing a terrific offensive, we've got defensive things in place in spades, we'll have four different barriers in place. And we also have detection work, and response plans in place. What if something surprises us make sure they're not in the Great Lakes, we're using all kinds of tools. And I don't think we're in we can't stop what we're doing like mowing your grass, right? The grass is growing, we can't stop doing anything. It's not solved. But doing what we're doing is reducing the risk and a place where we're buying time for for these other things to take hold in place. I think the other thing, you know, frankly, is the other part of the coin, it's surprising that these fish actually taste good. And that's going to be part of its downfall is that we can take advantage of that. Those two things is that we've got tools in place. And actually we're going to use the carps best qualities against itself are the things I like to get out more than anything?

David Evans:

Yeah, the taste factor is going to be huge. And getting that out there. And it sounds like you guys are really pushing that and incorporating into a lot of state activities, which is fantastic. I was just making a note here as, as you were describing, as kind of the offense and defense. Now I was imagining you and your team are the offensive coordinators for the the team fighting Asian carp and the US Army Corps of Engineers or the defensive coordinators for the football team. And you have scouting reports on the on the other team. And

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

yeah, you know, and we scouting reports is great Chicago Bears. But you know, I've been working with the Corps of Engineers, you know, they're the US Army Corps of Engineers. And some of those maps, you call them plans, but their battle plans. Right? Well, where's the enemy? So there's lots of ways you can think about it. I like works much better. But yeah, where's the where's the enemy? As you get caught in some with you know, I've been in the Pentagon talking to the Assistant Secretary of the Army about some of these efforts. That's pretty intimidating. Well, Pentagon, and you're talking to Asian carp, that's so cool. So no, they're great partners, because they are laser focused. And the thing that they're operating some of the biggest electric barriers in the world to protect the Great Lakes from Asian carp. It's pretty amazing. I mean, with everything else they have to do in the world, building bridges and rescuing people and doing everything they do. So what a great

David Evans:

team we have. That's fantastic.

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

And I guess, you know, we didn't talk about that, David is the partnership is so important because the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative dollars came on about 10 years ago when we needed the most, you know, we're trying to protect the Great Lakes and it was recognized early on that Asian carp kid in the Great Lakes, that's gonna be a problem. So they were well funded to do this task. That's not always the case. So we are well funded. I don't think we're over funded. You know, I always do a little bit more, but, but we're adequately funded for this huge task. So the state of Illinois supported that way. corps of engineers, our Fish and Wildlife Service are USGS partners, and our other states that are bailing these other things around the Great Lakes. So. So having the funding and the support that way is something that can't be under discussed.

David Evans:

Yeah, those partnerships are so key. And it's, it sounds like you have a great team working on this. I guess. So for someone listening to this podcast, that they just get super jazzed about Asian carp, and they're feeling passionate, and they want to help in protecting native species from invasive carp. How could they get involved? What would you say to someone who maybe lives near the Mississippi or the Illinois, or maybe they live far away? They live in Alberta, Canada, where, where I'm calling you from? What would you say to

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

citizens when I talk to people in Illinois, and it doesn't matter where you are, is that the biggest thing because you're out on the landscape, you have a boat, you're going from this lake, or watershed or river to another one, because you're going to kayak and enjoy the day or you're fishing, you have to take care of what you're doing. So in Illinois, I think I mentioned we have a campaign be a hero transport zero. So every time you're out there, you leave a body of water, you have to make sure everything is drained. You know that piece of vegetation that gets caught out in the prop gets taken, remove that throw it away at the boat ramp, because whether it's Eurasian water, milfoil, or hydrilla, or if if Asian carp or young Asian carp are in the live well of your boat. By drying everything out, now you've reduced that risk to near zero of you been part of the problem. And that's important, because some people, I don't go to the Illinois River, I don't go to the Great Lakes. Well, if you go to the Mississippi River, and introduce something, we're connected, now it's up in the Illinois River because someone else brought it and the next thing you know, it's being then pushed on into the Great Lakes. So everybody has to do their part. And all of those are equally important. You know, we have to have good regulations and policy to make sure we're not putting these things out into the public and making sure people are responsible. And people have to make sure their activities are good. So power washing their boats and trailers. Every time I like to think about cousin it back in the day Addams Family, we don't want cousin it being pulled down the road on a trailer. You seen that where the vegetations hanging up? That is punishable in Illinois, Illinois. Yeah. So we just need to do the right thing.

David Evans:

Yeah, and it's across the continent across the world really try to not bring new species or even pathogens into new areas. I mean, in Alberta, one thing that we are really starting to deal with a lot is is whirling disease and the introduction of that and really affecting the trout and salmonid species up here. And it doesn't have to be just a plant or a fish, it can be a disease or something like that. So making sure everything is drained and everything is is dry and clean. Before you introduce into a new water body is really

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

important. We have a website. It's www dot transporte zero.org. And it walks you through all those steps, right, remove, drain dry. But it's so important. One of our best rules or laws we have on the books is about VHS, viral hemorrhagic septicemia. Got to have everything great. So for stopping a virus, guess what? pretty darn good at stopping Asian carp are pretty darn good at stopping those plant frag. Because we're, we're saying you can't have a wet boat and you can't have things visibly on the side of your trailers. When you're moving around and you can't move water from one place to the other. What a great is a common sense rule? It shouldn't be the VHS rules, the common sense rule. And it's something that we use here in Illinois. Yeah. Yeah. It's been very successful. Really.

David Evans:

That's great. That's great news. And I guess, you Well, you already kind of touched on where people can find out more but for listeners who who want to find out more about the work that you guys are doing, they can go to that website about those rules and guidelines on how you should be transporting watercraft or just moving between watersheds or what about if people are interested the work that you guys are doing to control agent

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

yes i would say go to www that asian carp that us very similar to our canadian asian carp.ca website our h us does have everything we're doing up to date our annual monitoring response plans what we're doing how we're doing it and then we we publish sister companion documents we call interim summary reports so what did happen what did we find last year the year before and all those topical news briefs that you know that come up on our activities both on the illinois and throughout the great lakes lastly i would say for illinois dnr fisheries is i fish illinois.org so www that i fish illinois all spelled out that org and we'll have all of our fishing highlights there but a lot of our new species and asian carp

David Evans:

well that's fantastic yeah so go check out those links they'll be in the show notes as well and go check out what they're doing down in illinois it's it's really impressive stuff and i guess just to finish off kevin if people are interested in pursuing a career in this space could you just give us an idea of of how you i mean you touched on it at the beginning but just how you got to where you got to today and a bit of a bit of your journey that took you to to your role with the with the state of illinois

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

sure i will try to be brief i'm a great lakes person i grew up in northwest ohio fishing on the mommy river western lake erie throughout the 70s so always enjoy being outdoors my uncle worked for the state of michigan as a district fisheries biologist and after you got i overcame a desire to be a paramedic or a firefighter as a as a young boy you know he's got a pretty good he gets to go fishing for a living so i did go to northland college and got my bachelors of science degree and followed up some graduate work at michigan state university really prepared me well when i came to the illinois river biological station at the illinois natural history survey in 1991 going out on the river really understanding a lot of dynamics of of the fish communities there and the surprise of an asian carp explosion on the illinois river which piqued my interest and and i guess the best thing of all of that is i had colleagues and supervisors that encouraged looking in and investigating those types of things you know it wasn't our mandate to report on asian carp it was to collect good information and data but here's a problem that was pretty obvious as it was growing up and we were able to get some information and start reading some research here in the us that just wasn't being done very exciting and i think i've been very lucky i actually think we're doing something about the problem making it better with the work i get to work with my colleagues today in illinois and across the great lakes basin to make this happen

David Evans:

well that is so fantastic and i just want to thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today i've really i feel like i've learned so much and i really appreciate you taking the time i'm sure the listeners are gonna be thrilled with this episode and and be checking out all the links and trying to find out more about what were you what are you doing down in illinois

Kevin Irons, Illinois Department of Natural Resources:

well thanks for your interest in a time on this topic we certainly have to tell the story because it's not over yet but we do want to do the very best we possibly can so thanks again david

David Evans:

thanks for tuning into today's episode about asian carp i'll put links in the show notes about all of these different companies that are starting to create products using asian carp now you should probably check out because they're very cool i just like to thank kevin irons for spending the time to chat with me about this amazing topic make sure you're subscribed to the podcast because we will be releasing the full deep dive interviews with chuck later this week i'm so excited that i had the chance to speak with all of them because they all brought such different perspectives but all working towards the same goal of how do we prevent further spread of these invasive species and how can we deal with their current problem thanks again for all of that help guys if you want to help with the asian carp crisis you can do so if you live in the great lakes area by reporting any fish that seems a little bit strange kevin describes bighead and silver carp as silvery large fish that look like they have their head on upside down i think it's a pretty good description i'll put links in the show notes about different websites where you can learn more about this topic and where you can actually report potential asian carp the might have found to local authorities so that they can take them for investigation one thing that we can all do to prevent the spread of invasive species especially aquatic invasive species is be really careful with when we move between different water bodies so if you are moving a boat make sure that your boat is drained and dry and doesn't have any stowaways on board so no muscles no pieces of plant material no fish and alive well and no bait that goes between different lakes please don't release any fish into any water body if it's not originally from there that means i'm looking at you goldfish i'm looking at you minnows for fishing all of these types of fish can really be destructive if they're released unable to breathe out of control so please don't bring anything to where it's not supposed to be and hopefully we will have any more crisises on our hands recently it was discovered that moss balls used in aquariums across western canada by aquarium hobbyists had actually been hiding a little secret stowaway along with them zebra mussels were being brought in and we're being sold at pet stores in these moss balls so these are really examples of ways that we can introduce new species unwittingly and we have to be really careful so if you have moss balls in your aquarium please let your local conservation officer know i'm the host and producer David Evans and i just like to thank the rest of the team for the aquatic biosphere project specifically to Paula Polman, Sophie Cervera and Anna Bettini thanks for all of your help to learn more about the aquatic biosphere project and what we're doing here in alberta telling the story of water check us out at aquatic biosphere.ca and if you have any questions or comments about the show we'd love to hear them email us at conservation@aquaticbiosphere.org please don't forget to like subscribe and leave us a review it really helps us out tha ks and it's been a splash