Minnesota Carp Bill
For decades, invasive carp (silver, bighead, black and grass carp) have been working their way up the Mississippi River toward Minnesota. Invasive carp outcompete native fish for food and space, leading to a decline in ecosystem diversity and water quality in rivers where they are established.
Recently, commercial fishermen caught the highest number of silver carp ever found so far upstream in the Mississippi River. The catch shows that these invasive fish are on the cusp of becoming intractable in Minnesota and Wisconsin. Therefore, we have only a small window of time to stop invasive carp before they start reproducing in Lake Pepin, the metro Mississippi, the St. Croix and Minnesota rivers, and other treasured waterways.
There is no “cure” for invasive carp. Once these species dominate an ecosystem, government agencies spend millions of dollars trying to mitigate the damage with limited success. The much more effective and cost-efficient option is to prevent carp from reaching as much of Minnesota as possible.
LPLA has joined many other nonprofits in the Stop Carp Coalition to support a bill that would provide funding to the Minnesota DNR to install carp deterrent systems at Lock and Dam 5 in Winona, Minnesota. These deterrents would prevent invasive carp from moving further upstream, without impacting commercial traffic on the river.
How you can help
Sign our petition urging leaders to do their part to help prevent invasive carp from reaching further upstream on the Mississippi River: