An ugly, greedy, uninvited non-native species is fouling the waters at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge and is undoing years of habitat improvements at the Refuge. The common carp (Cyprinus carpio) is also causing big problems.
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The Common (European) Carp is native to eastern Europe and Asia, where many folk love to eat them. But carp have been carelessly introduced to over 50 countries almost everywhere in the world, including into the US in the early 1800s and the Refuge in the 1920s.
There are three carp subspecies; European, Deniz, and Amur. Carps are also related to the common goldfish and koi. An Asian carp variety, the silver carp, can be seen in countless Youtube videos, jumping up from Midwest Rivers by the thousands when a boat passes by.
Most carp are edible but it’s tedious to remove all the small bones from carp filets. Common Carp are usually about two feet long and weight about 10 lbs.
Common carps feed on the muddy bottom of water bodies, destroying pond plants, sullying the water, eating fish eggs and outcompeting other fish and waterfowl who also eat those same plant roots, water bugs and worms. A female carp also outbreeds its competition, laying over one million eggs per year. Oddly, the carp is also listed as “Vulnerable” within its original wild range.
These invasive carp, sometimes called “the feral pigs of the waterways,” have degraded the Malheur Wildlife Refuge to the point it provides only 5-10% of its potential habitat for waterfowl. A 1982 Study found that from 1942 to 1980, average annual waterfowl production at the Refuge fell from over 111,000 to just over 33,000.
The author stated that the voracious carp had “...greatly reduced submergent vegetation,” especially the sago pondweed. Diving Ducks really like to eat Sago pondweed and the aquatic bugs it harbors. Carp eradication produced dramatic increases in sago productivity and improved Redhead diving duck populations.
www.fsl.orst.edu/...
The Refuge has produced Narrative Reports every 4 months for decades. The reports provide extremely detailed logs of the comings and goings of dozens of migratory birds, from coots to trumpeter swans.
The Reports also document the Refuge’s historic anti-carp activities. The old Reports are fun to read, full of bird migration data, and sometimes have cool pictures. Here is a 1955 Report; sorry, very slow link. You can also Google Malheur Wildlife Refuge Narrative Reports and find half a dozen Reports on-line.
ecos.fws.gov/…
In 1947, for instance, the Report stated the first Sandhill Crane arrived on February 28 and nested in the cattails. Whistling Swans and rough-legged hawks overwintered there.
The Refuge aggressively killed coyotes, but considered mink and Bobcats a lesser threat.
the Refuge’s January-April low temperature was -11 F.
The 1953 first quarter Report continued to carefully note the first appearances of the hundreds of avian species that utilize it, and their numbers, including the Killdeers’ March 1 arrival. The mild spring’s lowest temperature was 10 degrees F. Water was scarce; worse than 1947.
By 1955, the Narrative Reports began mentioning the plague of Carps in the Refuge and the first eradication program. That September Report noted the removal of 13 tons of carp from one River, with only one trout found, as “little progress,” because you could “literally walk across the river on carp.”
By 1985, an Environmental Assessment complained of the Refuge’s “...continued inability to effectively manage..” the introduced carp, despite carp control programs in 1960-1, 1968-9, and 1977. The Refuge lamented that budget cuts would allow the carp to destroy additional waterfowl habitat.
Southeast Oregon also provide the only habitat for the endangered Great Basin redband trout, a primitive “missing link” between the cutthroat and rainbow trouts. The overabundance of carp, in addition to degrading avian habitat, have driven most redbands out of the river systems in the Refuge’s vicinity.
The 1993 Report revealed the Refuge’s relentless attack on carp. They used dynamite and poison, and drained over 20 ponds, thus killing 80,000 carp.
By the late 2000s, however, the carp had returned. Now the Refuge stepped up its game. The Refuge brought together dozens of local ranchers and environmentalists to achieve a consensus over the Refuge’s goals. For four years, Refuge personnel, tree-huggers, elected officials, bird watchers, ranchers, and even the Hammonds discussed the Refuge’s direction and practices at scores of meetings.
www.seattletimes.com/...
This unlikely coalition helped the Refuge produce a final Environmental Impact Report in 2013 that resolved many past conflicts. The coalition’s unofficial slogan is, “What’s good for the birds is good for the herds.”
Now the Refuge could focus on getting rid of the Carp. Instead of poison and dynamite, this time the Refuge has a Fish Biologist, Linda Sue Beck, assigned to ousting the Carp. The Refuge began the largest Carp removal in history. www.opb.org/...
“My vision,” Beck told OPB,”is within 10 years to really have the lake cleared up and have a lot of submerged aquatic vegetation and have millions of more birds.”
However, Ms. Beck is not at her desk these days at the Refuge. Gun thugs have taken over her office and covered her desk with pizza boxes and ammunition.
Ryan, Ammon Bundy’s brother, sneeringly calls her “the carp lady,” according to the Seattle Times.
“She’s not here working for the people,” he added,”She’s not benefiting America. She’s part of what’s destroying America.”
In other words, hundreds of Harney County residents worked with the Refuge and their biologists for years to sort out grazing and water rights disputes and continued to work together to eradicate the carp.
But now the Bundys stroll in, condemn the local residents’ plans, and interrupt their efforts with an armed occupation of public lands. I guess the Bundys prefers carp. Those invasive bottom feeders do stick together.
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