Northern Snakeheads in the Potomac

[DonRocks]

If you want to look at the bright side of things, the northern snakehead is considered a delicacy in China and Thailand, and we won't have to worry about overfishing them.

That said, I'm not sure I'd want to be a rockfish or a frog that was next to one in the water.

[JPW]

Mmmmmmmm.

Snakefish that has slowly been marinaded with all of that good yummy Potomac River toxic sludge.

Mmmmmm.

[Stone]

Oddly, I find that this topic makes my skin crawl.

[slowday]

If you want to look at the bright side of things, the northern snakehead is considered a delicacy in China and Thailand, and we won't have to worry about overfishing them.

That said, I'm not sure I'd want to be a rockfish or a frog that was next to one in the water.

Yeah this is really bad news and its kind of hard to believe that these fish have found their way into more than one body of water in the area. In the Washington Post story it says that the only thing the fish and game authorities can do is ask fisherman to kill any they find; maybe offer a hat as a reward and pray that the snakefish don't overrun the fishing stocks.

slow

[Mayhaw Man]

In Louisiana we have a little different way of looking at what others consider to be a problem-

"Our fish are still there, and whether their populations are depressed or not, we don't know," Thomas said. "At this point we're just looking for good recipes."

Carping about carp in Louisiana waters.

There is alot of interesting reading about both Maryland and Louisiana and their related invasive species problems in The Underwater Times. You can scroll down a bit in the middle column and see what the real problem is with the carp here (they have invaded the rivers of the Delta in huge numbers). Men running their boats at night have to have windscreens made of wire to protect themselves from these fish that seem to be motivated to jump straight up out of the water by the sound/vibration of an outboard motor. It is kind of funny when you see it, intil you realize that getting hit in the face with a large fish while going 50 mph would suck in the extreme. They are completely taking over some streams (The Boeuf and the Tensas Rivers in Northeastern Louisiana have been particularly plagued with these fish).

[slowday]

They are completely taking over some streams (The Boeuf and the Tensas Rivers in Northeastern Louisiana have been particularly plagued with these fish).

From another link on the Underwater times web page it seems like delta is about to have lots of company in its carp misery.

http://www.jsonline.com/news/state/may04/226545.asp

These carp are huge. Maybe we can send you some snakeheads and they will take care of the carp in the water; and then when they start crawling on the land looking for another body of water they can also put a big hurt on the herds of nutria.

slowday

[Mayhaw Man]

I will have to scan the picture to prove it as I only have it in old world technology, but I have a photo of my then 9 old lying on the dock next to one of those carp that is literally longer and heavier than he was at that point. The things get really big.

The real problem with them (from a strictly Lousiana-"it must be good if it swims" point of view is that they are carp. They don't eat bait much. We caught the one we photographed off of my parents dock when they were schooling around my dads fish feeder (don't ask-it's pretty strange). They show up at 7 a.m. when the thing goes off just like clockwork. They are fun to catch as they fight like crazy (picture a pike without teeth) but they are so bony that they are a poin in the ass oto clean and the meat is not particularly tasty (we tried, it was our duty as denizens of this state to try and make a meal out of the thing). The Vietnamese guys up in the Delta (there are lots of them, oddly enough-reminds them of home somehow) clean them and make lots of tasty stuff like fish balls out of them, but even they have a hard time getting a decent piece of meat off of them large enough to do anything with.

[Mabelline]

Stupid damn people. Invasive species have caused more grief, and cost so much.

[wesza]

I'm very familiar with "Snakehead" one things for sure, don't mix it up with Carp.

In fact in Asia it's not unusual to bring Snakeheads into a Pond thats used for raising various types of Fish for the market. The reasons for them being introduced is that live Snakeheads sell for higher prices then the other Pond raised Fish. The main reason for adding them to the mix is that they will cull out all the fry, smaller and weaker Fish inhabiting the Pond permitting a survival of the fittest situation permitting optimal growth of all the species and better market prices.

In many Lakes in Malaysia they share the Waters with Largemouth, Peacock and Tunacare Bass but are the catch of choice since they fight better and hit top water plugs voraciously plus are better eating.

One thing for sure that the Carp explosion would be controllable if the same areas were shared. I often have felt that this Fish is a warm water type of Pike, Muskie or even Barracuda.

In the Fish Ponds they are segregated before Chinese New Year in fenced off areas where they are fed live fry for several months to gain weight and fatten for Market, it's something to watch their feeding frenzy.

I hope that they are controllable but they could be utilized like the "Tiger Muskies" by being introduced after sterilization to try and control stunted or other fish populations since they survive in murky over vegetated water. It's now being done with the Muskies for several years in Washington State, including "Green Lake" in Seattle where there have been several instances of somebody hooking a planted Rainbow Trout or catching a Carp only to have their tackle overwhelmed by a Muskie who graped their catch.

Irwin