Chapter 2

In Illinois, a group called the "Red Necks" decided to go fishing.  In rural America, it was common to do sports activities like water skiing and boating on the weekends.  It would be some decades later, 2015.  The kids known as the red necks were just good old Americans who grew up around the Great Lakes and to the oddity of immigrants, these were folks that never had seen the ocean in their entire lives.

The only exposure they had to Asian fish were at the sushi restaurants.  And to them carp was seen as garbage fish which were worthy of fishing.  This wasn't the case globally.  In England, carp fishing was seen as a very viable sport.  In Mongolia, carp fishing was a staple and even celebrated yearly as a tradition.

In Russia and Poland, carp was eaten during Christmas.  The Orthodox Church permitted eating of fish but not meats during the holidays.  Oddly, this tradition and even the Asian traditions were simply absent in the rural states.

The red necks decided to pack up in their garage.  The main fellow, Jerold had a very beautiful Shimano fishing pole.  It was so good that he could have used it near the shores of the Atlantic Ocean.  His buddy Mark had never gone fishing before but was just excited to catch some bass.  Bass fishing was the main sport in America.  Without bass, the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River would be more of a catfish and paddlefish area.  Of course the other two fish weren't as prized as bass in the fishing world.

In America, there was a prize for the largest ever bass caught at $1,000,000.  This insane carrot makes bass fishing one of the biggest tourist attractions for fisherman domestically.

"Hey Jerold, let's go fishing and enjoy our weekend."  says Mark.  "In fact, I want that $1,000,000.  I hope I catch a big fish today.  I'm hoping 25 lbs at least."

"Haha, well I hope so Mark."  laughs Jerold.

For the most part, Mark and Jerold would be the first kids to experience something completely unexpected.  They both head to the dock in Peoria, Illinois where most kids went to go fishing.  They took their automobile and their tow and backed up to the dock.  The lowered the boat into the water.

It was a beautiful day in Illinois.  It was quiet.  The sun was shining, and nobody was out this early.  Only Jerold and Mark were there.  As they lowered the boat, they loaded up on sandwiches, some fishing bait, and a some colas.

Mark and Jerold had a row boat.  They slowly rowed out to the river.  Mark sat down and threw out his hook into the river.  As it fell into the water, it created a ring of waves.  It was so quiet, that you could hear the water drops and the clear breeze.

Jerold opens up a can of Coke and sips.  Mark opens up a grilled cheese sandwich and bites into it.  Both of them talk about life.  Jerold had a huge crush on a high school girl in his class, Andi.  Andi was just a popular girl who cared nothing about fishing.  She just cared about fast cars and iPhones.

Mark on the other hand didn't have much of a love life.  He didn't care much for popularity in school.  He was more about learning the world.   In fact, Mark was thinking about leaving Illinois after high school to join the Navy.  His dream was to see the world.

Some town kids really never saw too many international folks.  In California and New York, Chinese and Japanese were very common.  In fact, due to their port locations, it was easy to see commerce between the two great Asian nations in these regions of America.

But rarely did you see anybody cross through the small town of Peoria.

"Jerold, I guess you have big dreams about Andi.  I'm sure that with your family background and your moves to college, you'll be alright in that department."  laughs Mark.

"For me?  I'm thinking about seeing the world.  I mean I want to see Germany, South Korea, and Japan.  I want to see how it is out there.  You know what I mean?"  explains Mark.

"Yeah Mark, I get you.  The US Navy surely pays your way through stays and you get a G.I. Bill too.  They pay for your college after your service."  says Jerold.

Of course, that was just it.  Kids basically relied heavily on the U.S. government to gain a career.  There just wasn't much left in the United States.  While America was churning out children to purchase iPhones and watch music videos on cable, the Chinese were churning out children to become engineers and workers.

The U.S. economy was basically a multi-national economy where jobs were going overseas and the kids in America were spending their parents' money to buy the products.  We had a huge outflow of spending to support jobs overseas.

No longer was there good jobs coming out of America.  In fact, much of the large corporations were investing abroad abandoning the American labor force.   Mark saw an opportunity through the Navy.

Soon it was noon.  The sun was out and more kids were out in the river.  One guy had a motor boat.  He zoomed pass Mark and Jerold.  Jerold starts yelling.

"Hey keep it down!  I'm trying to fish here you know!"  yells Jerold.

The kids laugh with their beers in their hand.  The red necks were a mix generation of fishing guys and drunk motor boaters.

Mark and Jerold shake their heads attempting to calm down.  And then it hits them.  Boom!  Boom!   Something hits the bottom of their boat.  Mark looks scared.  So petrified that Jerold thought he saw an episode of Jaws.

Jerold soon becomes scared himself.  He slowly turns around and looks past his shoulder.  One fish.  Two fish.  And then hundreds, thousands, and millions of Asian Carp start jumping out of the water.

Jerold starts to yell.  "Ahhh!!!!".   It was obvious that these kids had never seen Asian Carp in their life.   These fish were strong swimmers.  They were so skittish that they would jump 30 feet in the air if they felt any sort of vibration.

For the entire morning, Jerold's boat was quiet and kept the waters calm.  The red neck motor boaters riled up the fish.  And nobody knew that they existed.

Millions of fish were jumping like popcorn as far as the eye could see.  There was just no way that Jerold and Mark would get out of the water in time.

Eventually a huge 100 lbs Asian Carp jumps into the boat.  Mark starts to cry.  He's bewildered.  Not understand what is going on at the moment.  Jerold ducks hoping to avoid disaster.

In a slow flash, Jerold thinks about Andi.  His dream of getting together with the popular girl and asking her out and a date flashes before his eyes.

Mark ducks and his face is literally in a jumping Asian Carp in the boat.  It's 100 lbs.  Bigger than any fish he's ever seen in the river.  So much for his bass fishing.  Here where he dreamed of catching the largest bass fish to gain the $1,000,000 prize was replaced by a fish that dwarfed any record catch in America.

The fish was so large it literally took up 1/3 of the boat.  But Mark had no time to think.  He just ducked and his face was being battered by the jumping fish in the boat.  It was either face the fish jumping in the boat or get hit by flying carp by the millions.

Jerold thinking about his dream girl starts to cry and stand up.  At this point he's lost it.  No longer was he afraid.  He had literally given up on himself.  It stands ups yelling.

"Jerold!  What the heck are you doing?!"  yells Mark.  "Get down from there!"

Within seconds, Jerold is hit with an Asian Carp behind the head.  And then another from the front of his head.  And then one hits him hard in the chest.  So hard that he bruises his heart immediately.   Each fish is about 30 lbs.  You can compare them to a beautiful King Salmon from Alaska.  It was that large.

And then another and another.  At this point, Jerold became a human target for Asian Carp.  One hits him in the side, breaking his ribs.

Mark is in dismay.  He's scared but refuses to get up to help Jerold.  And then a big Asian Carp.  Almost 90 lbs jumps.  This one directly jumps in the face of Jerold.   Slowly Mark sees the fish headed towards Jerold's face.

"Jerold!!!!"  yells Mark in fear.

The fish hits him directly in the face.  At 10 miles per hour the 90 lbs fish was a missile ready to kill.  It hits Jerold in the face and you hear a crack.   It was the blow that nobody wanted to see.

Jerold falls, the Asian Carp had literally broken his neck.   All of this was the most frightening thing that Mark could ever see.

All on a weekend where the two high school boys just simply wanted to go bass fishing.

Chapter 1

It's 1979, the Japanese were invading America in a different manner.  With their introduction of Datsun cars and much more efficient motors, America's industry was struggling.  It was easy to see that America was headed down a path of another Great Depression if we didn't change as an industrial nation.

My name is Jack.  I'm a USGS biologist.  The story starts in Arkansas.  It's the state where fish farming is the mainstay.  Most farmers farm catfish for the South.  It's a delicious meal in cajun cooking but that's not what we're here about.  We are here to tell the story of Asian Carp.  A fish that invaded our lakes and eventually destroy everything we enjoyed about our rural states.

"Hello Jack, I'm Laura, a daughter of the Arkansas Catfish Farm.  I just wanted to let you know that we've kept the ponds clean and our catfish are up to the standards of the FDA.  There are no parasites in our fish, hun."  says Laura.

"Laura, I really appreciate your Southern Hospitality.  I'm here to do my job and stay out your way of business.  As you know I'm always favorable to the American businesses.  Thank goodness the Japanese haven't invaded our fish markets yet."  says Jack.

In rear of the office, the conversation at Arkansas Catfish Farm was different.  Laura's father, Bill was in talks with a Chinese fishing farmer to try and keep the ponds clean to the specifications of the FDA.  Obviously the farm was indeed struggling to keep it clean enough to keep it open.

Mr. Xie Chen was in talks with Bill attempting to bring in cheap sustainable carp which would eat up any unwanted vegetation which was seen as harmful to the edible catfish for market.  What was originally seen as a genius idea soon would later change the course of history.

First, Mr. Xie Chen suggested three types of carp.  Grass Carp, Common Carp, and Black Carp.  These fish were beautiful.  The grass carp was the most prized fish in China.  It's stream submarine bullet shaped body really made it a desirable shape to sell in the Chinese fish markets.

The common carp was a pest fish in America.  The Germans brought them to America hoping they would become sustainable fish for the new settlers but it never took hold.  Americans didn't want carp nor wanted to eat carp.  Even though the common carp was European in origin.

The Black Carp was much harder species to maintain.  Similar to the shape of grass carp, black carp relied on crustaceans.  They ate crawfish and mussels.  This meant that farmers had to feed these fish different things in the pond to keep them going.  However, in China, Black Carp was more expensive than some salmons.

At the time Jack never realized the problems that Arkansas was facing.  They were struggling to keep their ponds open due to the water conditions. Catfish was born out of necessity during the Great Depression in the South as a main source of food.  It was also one of the few bottom feeders that Americans ate in the early 1980's.

As Jack left the compound, Bill and Chen came out talking about shipping in the carp.  Laura was stunned.  She couldn't understand why a Chinese farmer would be in the South while the Japanese were already destroying the very foundation of American automobiles in Detroit.  It was as if Bill, her father, turned to the dark side betraying what it mean to be American, or Made in the USA.

Bill pulls Laura aside and explains, "Laura, the Chinese have been farming fish for over 2,000 years.  They have insight and experience that us white folk don't have.  Trust me on this, the carp will keep our business going."

Laura just sighs and agrees with the assessment that something had to be done to keep the business afloat.  You see, all around Arkansas, the Japanese Inc. was bypassing America in every field except farming.  GE and Zenith had just fallen under by better Panasonic televisions.    Toyota was building cars faster and better than anything Ford could conjure up.

And although the cow industry and fish industry was purely American in nature, it wasn't long before the fish farmers realized that the Japanese may come into America introducing their own versions of better beef and fish.

Mr. Chen speaks about the fish.  "Bill, the carp is a hardy fish.  It's cherished and worshiped in China.  You only need to keep it in the pond and it will clean it for you.  You need not feed them.  Sir, it's a magical fish which can be cooked and eaten over sweet and sour sauce.  You cannot go wrong sir."

Bill smiles, obviously knowing that carp would never be another catfish nor salmon.  It just didn't fare well in the South.  Most rural Americans saw carp as garbage fish.  They would make thousands of jokes about carp.  It was a pest fish.

Both Chen and Bill stood by the fish pond.  With a bucket of fry, they released some Asian Carp into the ponds as little critters.  The carp swam away beautifully as you would see them in paintings in China.  These weren't the specially bred species that most of us are used to seeing in koi ponds.  These were just gray fish, happy to swim in the waters.  No matter how dirty the ponds were.

Little did Arkansas know that they started something that would become irreversible in nature.  Carp would not only stay in the ponds to clean, they would eat so much vegetation that they would thrive in the pristine American water ways.

Eventually Jack the USGS biologist would return for inspections at Arkansas Catfish Farms.  Jack walks up and looks bewildered.  What he saw was a pond so clean that he just smiled.

"Bill, Laura, how on Earth did you manage to keep the ponds so clean?  I mean look at them catfish.  I feel like taking one out now and cooking it up in oil.  Sheesh..."  says Jack.

"Look, I'm no rocket scientist, but I am a certified biologist, and I'm seeing something here that could save America from the Japanese invasions.  I mean this could change fish farming forever."  Jack continues...

"What's that additional fish in the ponds?"  Jack asks. "Is that common carp there?"

"No." says Laura. "That's grass carp.  Mr. Chen suggested that we use these Chinese variety to eat up the vegetation and it wouldn't interfere with the catfish."

"That's just amazing stuff."  says Jack.  "Okay well I'm going to pass this idea along to every fisherman in our area.  I mean the waters never been this clean since we started inspections."

Jack was right.  What the USGS wasn't telling fish farmers was that the Chinese and even the Vietnamese were working to import cheaper fish from abroad.  Big chain stores like Sams and Wal-mart weren't interested in patriotism.  They cared about cheaper labor and bigger margins.

It wasn't long before GE, Zenith, and even American Motors were gone.  Much of what we saw as American icons in the industry began dying off.  Soon, the Japanese owned everything.  Pebble Beach CA became a Japanese company.  GE sold it's television unit to Japan.  Zenith as a brand just faltered.

And the catfish?  Well the farmers fought hard.  It wasn't long before the Vietnamese introduced their own native catfish.  Known as "Swai" or "Basa", these fish were easy to grow, they were easy to fillet, and these catfish were easily 1/2 the price of American catfish.

It wasn't long before swai fish became a staple in cheap American grocers.  Vietnam fish were seen as acceptable.  As were much of the ocean fishes which were caught off waters in other nations.  Except in this case, they weren't ocean fish, they were river fish.

What was happening to the auto industry and the consumer electronics industry was just getting started with the fish industry.