Well, I wil be soon, anyway.
We have a 10,000-ish sq/ft pond on our property that has an issue with hydrilla. Hydrilla is an invasive, hearty, fast growing aquatic grass that can take over an aquatic biome in a very short time, and when our pond drops to a certain level the ducks can practically walk across the thick underwater floes of grass.
Basically, there's three ways to deal with hydrilla. Way 1 is chemical. You spray a bunch of stuff on the surface of the pond, it sinks and settles on the hydrilla and kills it. "They" say it doesn't harm the fish or other creatures that depend on the biome of the pond to sustain themselves (we have a LOT of turtles, too), but that's kind of misleading because while the chemical itself doesn't harm the animals, killing a huge part of the pond biome all at once can change things for the worse for the creatures. Then you have all that dead and biodegrading material in there to deal with. So chemical was out.
Way 2 is dredging. Basically a giant claw goes in and rips the hydrilla out. Again, problematic. That claw does not discriminate what it scoops out, and even the tiniest shred of remaining hydrilla can easily multiply and take over the pond again. so, another nope.
Way 3: This guy
That's a triploid grass carp, and he just love him some hydrilla.
Triploid grass carp adoption in Florida is a somewhat involved process, as you first have to obtain a license. These are classified as invasive species and apparently you;re better off getting caught running an illegal kangaroo fight club than having an unlicensed grass carp. The license in Florida is free, though, and only requires you to fill out some paperwork, have a site survey (mine was done via google earth) and chat with someone from the Florida carp bureau, which is a governmental department I did not know existed until recently. Once armed with your license, you are free to place an order with a licensed carp farm, of which one exists in Florida.
The folks at the State carp department were actually amazing and interesting. I ended up having a long chat with a State biologist who just seemed thrilled that his biology degree led to a job that didn't involve wanking priceless racehorses into a customized horse fleshlight for $12/hr while his parents expressed their disappointment at his life choices.
The folks at the carp farm were also super cool, and they've put up with all my excited calls to see if my TWO carp were ready yet when they usually deal with municipalities or huge landowning businesses (like, say, Disney), ordering dozens or even hundreds at a time to manage multi-acre wetlands.
If all goes well, I'll pick up the carps Saturday near Ocala and have three hours to return them to our pond, where I have to match the temperature of their transportation water to our pond water very slowly so they don't go into shock before introducing them to our pond. They're both dudes (owning females is illegal) and being a triploid fish (a process is enacted during fertilization where a third set of chromosomes that are usually kicked out of the egg during development is retained) they are sterile. Once released, provided they survive, the biologist dude said they should clean the pond up within a year or so, and be able to survive after that on other aquatic flora and the hydrilla which will still be present, just not dominant.
Suggestions for names are always welcome. I will update when the young fellas come home.
How long do the carp live?
