Round Goby

Ran into a number of these guys for the first time in a river near me while seining for other species over the weekend. What do you guys do with them? I just put them back, but then after thinking about it I wonder if I should have killed everything I caught. Not that it would make a dent, but simply for ethical reasons.

I think its illegal in IL to return them back to the water.  Not sure though.  Definitely should kill them though.  I knew they were on Lake Michigan, but I didn't know of anywhere else.  Which river were they in?

They're in the Des Plaines and Illinois Rivers all the way to Peoria (a few have showed up even further downstream).  I've caught quite a few round gobies at Starved Rock below the lock & dam.

In my opinion (not NANFA's), it's absolutely ridiculous to require people to kill nonnative fish when doing so will not put a dent in their populations.  If we, the state agencies, and everyone and their grandmothers know that killing a couple individuals will not put a dent in the populations, then why make a regulation requiring people to do so?  Those type of regulations cause bowfin to be killed when they're mistaken for snakehead, sculpin to be killed when they're mistaken for gobies, buffalo to be killed when they're mistaken for carp, and so on and so forth.  It's just not a good idea to put the responsibility of killing certain species of fish in the hands of the mostly uneducated public.

That opinion applies only to well established nonnatives such as silver carp and round gobies.  If you catch a snakehead in Illinois, you should absolutely kill it to prevent the chance that it will become established.

If a state-wide plan is proposed that will actually put dents in the populations of those harmful species, then I'm all ears.

I throw them to seagulls and they are happy to eat them.

Yeah it was in the Des Plaines in Romeoville. Caught four or five of them in like a 10 min span. They were sitting in some rapids in a feeder creek.

i believe they're in the st lawrence big time. by the way, if you have trouble id ing fish , how would you ever know if it is an established species? each year in the regs and literature put out a sensible hit list.

I would feel better about the regulation if the state provided containers to dispose of the fish.  They would need to be more or less air tight and emptied every day.  At Carlyle Dam on the Kaskaskia River, which has hundreds of thousands of silver and bighead carp stacked up below it, there are signs that say you cannot leave dead fish on the bank.  That's a fantastic rule for a public fishing spot.  The injurious species regulation says you cannot release silver or bighead carp back into the water.  So what are your options?  Kill the fish (some of which are 30+ lbs), chuck them back into the water, and watch as they wash up on shore several dozen yards downstream from you?  The guy fishing several dozen yards downstream of you is going to be thrilled.  Take the fish home?  What if you don't have a cooler and you're not heading home that day?  Find a dumpster or garbage can in town and chuck the dead fish in it?  The people who live in Carlyle are going to be thrilled as the fish proceed to rot, especially in the hot of summer.  If garbage pickup is a few days away, believe me it is going to get nasty.

Silver carp below the dam.  Everything dark colored in the water is carp.

Zoomed in view of the red box.