Wednesday, July 14, 2004

Three shall be the number of the counting, and the number of the counting shall be three

Scientists are concerned about the number of black carp (Mylopharyngodon piceus) they're finding in the Mississippi River...even though that number currently stands at three. As reported by MSNBC, the fish have been caught over the last 1.5 years, and are thought to have escaped from catfish ponds, where they are employed to eat snails that carry disease-causing parasites. The carp are supposedly sterile, meaning that the risk of them reproducing in the wild is small, but there is still the possibility of a negative impact on native mollusk populations if these long-lived fish escape into the wild. Read an older ISW post about the black carp problem by clicking here.

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