A coastal resources manager with the Lake Huron Centre for Coastal Conservation believes the two Asian Carp that were found in Lake Ontario on the Toronto Water Front in August were introduced locally either by accident or on purpose.
Geoff Peach says the big threat is at the bottom of Lake Michigan where thousands of Asian Carp are separated from the lake by an electric fence in the Chicago Shipping Canal.
But Peach says for fish to get past that fence and up to Toronto they would have to pass through Lake Huron, Lake St. Clair and Lake Erie and he's not aware of researchers finding anything in those lakes to indicate that had happened.
Peach also points out that there is a large Asian population in Toronto that brings Asian Carp in for food. It is illegal to bring them in alive, but he believes that's more likely they were introduced locally than it is that they made it through the fence and up to Toronto.
Peach explains five carp have been found in the Toronto area over the last few months, and when carp are found researchers do a test to determine if they have a viable population and proper habitat for breeding.
That would add significantly to the problem, but he says, so far, the carp that have been found past the electric fence have not met those conditions.
