What do you do with 24,626 pounds of invasive carp? This Tennessee angler has a plan

A Tennessee angler is being cheered for hauling in nearly 25,000 pounds of invasive fish during his day on the lake last week, though some people are wondering if that counts as too much of a good thing.

What does one do with 25,000 pounds of a fish you can’t throw back?

It’s a question asked repeatedly on Facebook since Neil Matlock of Paris, Tennessee, shared photos showing he caught enough Asian carp to fill two fishing boats.

“My biggest day to date: 24,626 lbs of invasive carp removed from our beautiful lake yesterday,” Matlock wrote Jan. 15.

The massive haul came out of Middle Tennessee’s Kentucky Lake, a dammed body of water on the Kentucky state line that “covers 160,300 acres and features 2,300 miles of shoreline,” according to KentuckyLake.com.

Matlock, who also works as a hospital radiographer, targeted the carp with extensive nets, and video shows some tried jumping out of the water to avoid being caught. (Tennessee has four species of invasive carp, including silver carp that jump up to eight feet, the state reports.)

Details weren’t offered on how Matlock caught so many fish, but he did say it took three other men, including his brother James, to haul the carp out of the lake.

Commenters on the post have joked Matlock may have had divine guidance (“Did Jesus tell you to cast a net?” one asked.) However, most wanted to know what comes next.

“Ok, not to be a (dummy), what do you do with them?” one woman asked on Facebook.

Turns out, there’s a lot you can do with a fish nobody wants around, he said.

“We are actually using them for many things. Some are used for bait in salt water by other commercial fishermen, some are used for making dog and cat food, and some are eaten by people. It’s all dependent on the quality and size of the fish,” he wrote.

Coincidentally, Paris is home to North American Caviar, a wholesale fish company that buys Asian carp. Matlock thanked the company in his Facebook post, noting it lent him the second boat.

Asian carp are native to China and were accidentally introduced in the 1980s when they escaped from “aquaculture ponds in the delta areas of the Mississippi River during extreme floods,” the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency says.

All four invasive carp species are considered a threat to native fish and a danger to boaters (due to jumping), making it illegal to possess a live one in the state, the Tennessee Fishing Guide reports. A Facebook page — War on Carp — is devoted to anglers like Matlock who battle invasive Asian carp in Kentucky and Tennessee.

“People still don’t understand ... how bad they are,” one man posted on Matlock’s Facebook page.

“They’ve never ridden through an area and got hit as these things fly into the boat. Big heavy fish with hard heads. And not just one fish but big schools of them launching out of the water and sometimes injuring people in the boat.”

This story was originally published January 19, 2021 at 12:22 PM with the headline "What do you do with 24,626 pounds of invasive carp? This Tennessee angler has a plan."