From How Appealing:
“Something’s Fishy at the High Court”: Tony Mauro of The National Law Journal has this report.
And last Sunday’s edition of The Chicago Tribune contained an article headlined “Asian carp: Take that carp and fry it; River invader is more tasty morsel than maligned in some quarters.”
Another problem that the southern fish farmers pose is the interstate transportation of fish using natural waters.
As bills like H.R.3669 address the problems of invasive species by private pet owners, it should be noted that fish farmers have had meetings with officials of the Federal government discussing their belief that waters of fish being brought into our country need to be considered for problems. As industry will play an important role in helping keep our waters clean, problems including interstate transportation with no federal endorsement, disease, virus, invasive and chemical use are all problematic as fish farmers move their fish across state lines without considering the quality of water used or what is added. If legislation to eliminate exotic species and ornamental fish from being imported into our country is enacted domestic production and the transportation problems should increase. This water often ends back in our natural waters. Some fish farmers will deliver fish through fed –ex by air to all states. They even have a bait fish that has a patent pending that will live in salt or fresh water, which they will deliver this way. The Presidents Ocean and great lakes initiative is aware of this problem and how states such as mine did not bother to address water as problematic so long as the fish had an inspection using an international standard of fish testing with in the last year in another state out of any jurisdiction without regard for the water. Fish transported and sold in the US often change hands many different times with many different water changes and chemicals used without regard for state laws during transportation. In some states such as NY they can be brought into the state from anywhere in the country without worrying about water disposal. I have seen the transport water and it is often milky, suds, full of scales, dead fish, invasive (crabs, polliwog, etc.) with the possibility of pathogens and virus. In the mid 1990’s as the fish being delivered from Arkansas to me were dying of disease, it was not uncommon to see bait fish, ornamental s, food fish on the same truck being spread out from tank to tank as space was freed up, as I know I often added more water to take them to their next delivery. This water and the fish are often unloaded from tanks on trucks through pipes to tanks fed by natural water where the overflow is back into natural waters. I am in the industry and do believe that mandatory safe procedures can solve this and made many ignored suggestions to my state. As high level administration officials that now negotiate trade with China involving water movement through ballast systems, did not recognize virus and pathogens in natural waters for fish transport when they were involved as a senator in NY, despite knowing that our state university helping formulate policy about bait fish was busy studying virus in water, with a grant, I doubt whether they will care about the dangers of ballast water or the carbon footprints associated with bring foreign products into our country in order to keep our large retail employers shelves filled with foreign manufactured products.
It should be noted in history despite the historic legislation passed by the House of representatives in 2008 to curtail ballast water introduction of virus and pathogens in American waters, ( that was rejected in the 2008 because of fear it would override individual state rights to stronger legislation), this Administration has failed to address ballast water as the economic recovery begins to increase the amount of shipping activity, other than threw the week Coast Guard 2 decade purposed plan which mirrors another international organization made up of foreign countries, foreign sea captains, and foreign countries (IMO). It should also be noted that a military plan rather than legislation is subject to delay and change by the next commander and chief. To allow this to happen with insufficient protection, is the same way that the last president to address ballast water on a national level did prior to 2001, and it was then, ignoring national security and is now still ignoring national security.