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U.S. GOVERNMENT 1: MD Officials Against Asian Fish

On Tuesday, April 27, 2004, a Maryland fisherman got a big surprise at Pine Lake in Wheaton Regional Park in Wheaton, Maryland. When he realized he had caught a 19-inch Northern snakehead, he rushed to call the authorities.

Northern snakeheads are not a native species to the United States. Originally from Asia, the species can wriggle on land for short distances to move from lake to lake. The fish can eat so many smaller fish that it can destroy an entire ecosystem, which is why it is biologically programmed with the ability to move on land after it has eaten its way through previous water systems.

The fish is believed to be around four years old, but Steve Early, the assistant fisheries director for the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, stated that it is not known how long it has been in the lake, how it got there, or whether the fish is male or female. If it was female, breeding could have occurred, raising the population of the vicious fish. However, Early did say that it is not currently ‘spawning season’ for the fish, the time it is most likely to reproduce.

Park and state authorities have planned to drain the lake, as Northern snakeheads had infested a pond only miles away, leaving the ecosystem nonexistent in 2002. More than 1,000 young snakeheads and six adults were found when state officials poisoned this private pond in Crofton, MD, in the summer of 2002. They poisoned the pond to keep the fish from spreading and killing other ecosystems.

Pine Lake, where this new fish was caught, is north of Washington D.C., and feeds into a tributary of the Anacostia River, which then empties into the Potomac River. By draining the lake, biologists hope that the species will not be able to infect these larger water systems.

State biologists used electric shocks on Tuesday to try to locate other snakeheads in the lake, but none rose to the surface.

Officials believe that the snakehead was most likely a pet that was dumped by his owner. All of the Crofton fish were traced to a Maryland man who discarded his two fish after buying them live in a New York market. This incident led to the Department of the Interior’s banning of the import of 28 species of snakehead, including the Northern variety found in Pine Lake.

The Crofton incident also led state officials to take the policy of heading off invasive species, like the snakehead, before they invade. In hopes to stop ecologically dangerous, nonnative species from reaching Maryland, they are also currently fighting the threat of zebra mollusks, famed from invading the Great Lakes. The ultra-invasive mussels are now as close to Maryland as Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.

--Written by Hillary Rouse

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