Bighead carp found just six miles from Lake Michigan. Photo: Illinois Department of Natural Resources

A 20-pound bighead Asian Carp was fished out of Lake Calumet in Chicago, the first one found to have breached an electrical barrier designed to keep the voracious invader out of Lake Michigan, federal officials said Wednesday.

The fish was found Tuesday during routine sampling, according to the Asian Carp Regional Coordinating Committee, a group of government agencies trying to keep the fish out of the Great Lakes.

Agencies are working to remove any additional carp from Lake Calumet, just six miles downstream of Lake Michigan.

Fishery experts fear the prolific carp could dramatically alter the Great Lakes ecosystem by outcompeting native fish for food and habitat.

Environmental organizations used the discovery to renew calls to permanently block the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal which allowed the carp to travel from the Mississippi River watershed to the one that drains into Lake Michigan.

“Asian carp are like cockroaches, when you see one, you know its accompanied by many more you don’t see,” Henry Henderson, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Midwest Program said in a news release. “Now we can stop arguing about whether the fish are in Chicago’s canals and start moving as quickly as possible toward permanently separating the Great Lakes and Mississippi River watersheds.

Andy Buchsbaum, director of the Great Lakes Office of the National Wildlife Federation, said there were no more physical barriers to keep the fish out of Lake Michigan.

“If the capture of this live fish doesn’t confirm the urgency of this problem, nothing will,” Buchsbaum said in a news release. “We need to pull out all the stops; this is code red for the Great Lakes.”

An Asian carp was found on Dec. 3 in the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal below the electric barrier system and just above the
Lockport Lock and Dam, federal authorities say.  Intensive sampling began on February 17 to find the carp above the electrical barrier.  Sampling throughout the past four months did not produce the carp until now.

“We set out on a fact finding mission and we have found what we were looking for,” John Rogner, assistant director of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources said in a news release. “This is important evidence and the more information we have about where Asian carp are, the better chance we have of keeping them out of the Great Lakes.”

More carp news.

Here is the control plan and latest updates