United States Invasive/Alien Species

[Noto]

Lots of invasives are cool species. They should still be eliminated or controlled to the extent possible. I really don't know if the Great Lakes will ever recover from the abuse we've put them through the last century or so. Of course, the invasives are just the tip of the iceberg there.

 

[MN_Rebel]

Lots of invasives are cool species. They should still be eliminated or controlled to the extent possible. I really don't know if the Great Lakes will ever recover from the abuse we've put them through the last century or so. Of course, the invasives are just the tip of the iceberg there.

I dont think the Great Lakes will recover from the abuse with exotics.
Even the salmon and few species of trout aint native to the Great Lakes too except the lake and the brook trout.

Hope Asian carps and snakehead wont make to the Great Lakes in future but they will...one day.

 

[MultispeciesTamer]

there are always two sides of the story. And with gobys they are used as another forage fish by smallies and walleyes and Others. The great lakes will never be the same that is true but with global warming like affects it may get better. Over the last few years King numbers have been dwindling and i fear might dwindle to isolated populations. As for others Smallies are doing great there was a huge coho boom last spring and record number coho catchs this fall. Lake trout have returned to my local river and to the lake. Whitefish are still going strong. Walleyes are getting bigger and faster. All i can hope for is an increased Musky and Striper populations. Over the summer we caught tones of white perch for the first time ever along with a few perch and lots of freshwater drum. Now this is just my veiw from my little part of a giant lake system.

 

[MN_Rebel]

Too bad the Great Lakes whitefish/cisco species are uncommon (not lake whitefish or cisco). I just dont understand why Minnesota had to put white perch on probhited species list when we can eat them and treated them as roughfish with no limit...

 

[sp33dstix]

The Goby, the Carp, Lamprey Eel and the Snakehead (only a few found I think) all apply to Canada as well could be others. Carp have totally infested Lake Ontario and all the way up the Trent Severn waterway right into Peterborough (possibly further) that I have seen. The carp are also huge some over 2 or 3 feet in length as well not sure if that is normal but they are monsters.

My cousins from Europe love coming to Canada and catching those monster carp. I have yet to see or hear of a snakehead in Canada.

 

[Mikeberg]

I caught some bighead carp in the Illinois River and smoked them, they tasted good, but not as good as smoked salmon.

 

[fhawk362]

Round goby's are a major problem up north, every time I go fishing if your worm hits the bottom you will get a goby intstantaneously, it's estimated they're in the Millions in lake erie. Lake ontario has a greta number of them as well, ugly things

 

[warmouth]

Our biologist here in pennsylvania are finding that the round goby is making our gamefish bigger than ever!!! They are invasive and they do feed on the gamefishes fry and eggs, but they are here to stay... They cover the bottom of lake erie. Fisherman killing a couple hundred isn't going to put the slightest dent in the population. I found from my experience that I catch them in rocky bottoms and never on a sandy bottom. The biologist in pennsylvania say its just a matter of time before the round goby helps rewrite the record books for state records for size on smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, perch, walleye, and even lake trout and steelhead. They have found that these fish have been using the goby as a main source of food. The biggest perch I ever caught, I caught using a round goby as bait. I caught it on a minnow and rehooked it through the upper jaw and bounced it on the bottom and hooked a 14.5 inch yellow perch. As much as they are considered bad for the lake, they are doing some good, by providing an Great food source for the game fish!!

The problem is that they kill the native sculpins and are driving them into extintion, and that with less fry getting bigger eventually there will be less smallmouth and trout ( the big ones will get caught and die of old age), please do your research!

 

[warmouth]

The pollution has grown so much be it car fumes, construction,etc that some of the local canals are barren of fish except for African cichlids and they keep the mosquito population down (I prefer that over dropping poison like Miami gvmt enjoys doing)
The native tiny fish like Everglade sunfish,etc were going downhill in many areas not due to non natives but due to changes like the above.
To look at a canal thats barren is disgusting to see little non natives swim by is better and again keeps mosquitos down . I think non natives fill a niche that was open or opening due to man caused pollution and other problems that were hurting the native fish who were on their way out anyway.
You have cichlids in area canals that had no fish to begin with . Its like the Brown anole lizard which has replaced the green native anole in many areas not because it displaced it but because the growing population of humans ,cement backyards -lack of trees were killing it anyway thus it was on its way out.
Go to the Everglades TONS of Green anoles as no problem than go to many areas in Miami that are built up like Doral and only brown anoles because it was man who killed/killing the native thus the non native was able to adapt.
I prefer to have some nature than nothing thus LOVE the non natives I have never subscribed to that they displace much I think they simply step in where there is an opening.
Ofcourse if you introduce a snakehead where there are no fish like it or foxes where there are no predators like it than you have a problem but as a whole the non natives are harmless .
Its the pollution and the zillion feral cats in Miami that are the problem.

Research done has shown that the invasives are driving the natives into extintion.....not pollution, some areas of the everglades had low levels of pollution (western regions away from Miami); the canals act like a superhighway for asian swamp eels, mayan and firemouth cichlids , tilapia, etc. who have no natural predators in the US. Nobody minds cichlids ,snakeheads and swamp eels swimming in canals in Miami its them replacing natives in everglades national park thats disturbing.

 

[warmouth]

I've eaten them. They are a little crabby tasting, but it's mostly the consistancy that's the same. I fileted a dowzen that were ~1' each and got a thumb sized hunk of meat off of each filet. My hands were torn to hell, and my knife dull at the end of it. They didn't taste bad, but the cost/benefit ratio of them (labor intensive, tear up everything tearing them down) makes them not woth the effort. I wish they were so people would have a reason to pull them out of the rivers.

And on the round gobies... Don't get so excited about the game fish being bigger than ever. It won't do the trout fishery any good after all those huge fish eventually die after not having reproduced successfully. They also eat their partner in crime, zebra mussels, which, being filter feeders, filter out and act as reservoirs for conatminants. Thus contaminating the gobies, and on to the apex predators, which no one will be advised to eat because of the danger. I don't know a lot about the round gobies (not a problem down here), but I know they have the potential to devestate the ecosystem even more than they already are. If someone is pushing the benefits of an invasive species instead of giving the whole story, they are just acting as an invasive species apologist.

THank you ......alot of people post based on speculations and not research.