A fish that leaps right into your boat

Leaping carp
Originally uploaded by Brite light photos.

CHICAGO, Ill. - Waiting impatiently for the next-to-the-last episode of Dicken's Bleak House on PBS last night, I watched a program on Nature that looked at the collision of people and animals, including a segment about the Asian carp species, featered in the photo with today's blog.

(Ok, ok. I admit it! I watch public television, just not often...)

The story - which is very interesting - cannot compete with the video of these creatures leaping out of the water and sometimes landing in boats, with the people screaming while the fish flop all over. We are not talking about a couple of fish - we are talking about hundreds, all within 100 feet of the boats.

Outboard motors seem to scare them and when these fish jump, they don't have a lot of control over where they end up. I've had that problem myself lately.

In the Nature program, they showed 20-foot boats with protective screens on them because some of these carp weigh 50 pounds and can knock people down - or I suppose right out of the boat into the water boiling with these creatures.

Wild.

Right now the people of Chicago and all around the Great Lakes are hoping these critters don't escape into Lake Michigan where they could arguably take over and wipe out most of the other species of fish, fish themselves that have only recently recovered from the pollution of years past.

Here's a link to the story:

Reuters

In the meantime, you might consider rethinking carp as a part of your meal planning.

Jaysus, what am I thinking?

I take the idea of carp-as-food back. Forget I mentioned it.

I think I would go vegan, first.