This is a big deal, and I'm surprised it isn't getting more play:
A coalition of US senators from the Midwest are asking the US Army Corps of Engineers to speed up finding solutions to avert an Asian carp invasion of the Great Lakes that they worry is imminent.
What's driving the urgency, detailed in a letter sent Thursday, is the discovery of Asian carp environmental DNA, or eDNA, in Lake Michigan, near Wisconsin's peninsula. The sample, discovered by researchers from the University of Notre Dame and The Nature Conservancy, along with state officials, was a result of research conducted in May, outside the Sturgeon Bay shoreline, and reported this week.
During the eight years I lived in Michigan City, I learned to appreciate Lake Michigan as one of the state's treasurers. Because this is a problem in which states might disagree (the fishing and tourist industries here have different priorities than the shipping interests in Chicago), this is exactly the kind of case calling for a federal solution. And so far, one has been a little slow in coming.
