GRAND RIVERS, Ky. (AP) – Kentucky officials are hoping a noise-making, bubbling “fish fence” will help stop the spread of destructive Asian carp.
At Kentucky’s Barkley Dam on Friday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and others gathered to commission the new bioacoustic fish fence near a lock at the bottom of the dam. The $7 million, three-year field trial will help wildlife officials determine whether the device effectively keeps Asian carp from entering the lock and moving upstream.
The fence works as a deterrent by broadcasting noise at a frequency that irritates the carp. The noise is contained within a wall of bubbles that are lit by strobes. The combination has worked well in the laboratory and in smaller-scale outdoor settings.
Asian carp is a catch-all term for four species of invasive carp that have spread up the Mississippi River from the Gulf of Mexico as far as Wisconsin and into the Missouri and Ohio rivers and other smaller tributaries.