Thanks! Still incorrect… Common carp is a non-native species. Not invasive. Those two terms are consistently being confused. The common carp is only native to Asia. It was introduced in Europe in the 1600’s and in the US in the 1800’s and it has fully integrated on both continents. If ever a common carp population gets out of control in a given body of water, it is simply due to a lack of predators present. As long as there’s bass and other predators present in a lake, common carp will never be a problem.
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I’m well aware. Just because it isn’t as damaging as big-headed carp doesn’t mean common carp aren’t invasive. I get that various midwestern Natural Resources departments use the term “invasive” to refer to the four species of big-headed carp, common carp fit the definition of invasive in most of North America.
A species is invasive if it is:
-not native to the area, and
-predates upon or competes for food or spawing habitat with native species
Common carp fit every aspect of that definition.
Out west, some states have designated both brook trout and brown trout as low-priority invasives. That allows them to shift them from regulated game fish designation to unregulated. Since they are low-priority, management is passive; such as allowing anglers to take any size and number of them. In contrast, high-priority invasives like Lake Trout in Yellowstone are required take. If you catch a Lake Trout in Yellowstone you are required by law to kill it.
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IANAI (ichthyologist), but generally those terms are pretty synonymous. A non-native species thriving in a new environment is displacing whatever was there before. There are certainly levels of damage, as both earthworms and honeybees are invasive in North America, as are kudzu and Everglades boas. No one I know is pushing to eliminate the former, as opposed to the latter.
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Wikipedia:
is often considered a destructive invasive species,[2] being included in the list of the world’s 100 worst invasive species.
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Speaking as someone with a lake containing both both species, I can tell you that bass are not as predatory against carp as you seem to suggest.
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Apparently they’re available in copi-ous quantities…
Remind me to stay upwind of you…
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It looks like that’s actually where they made up the name from. 
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Give the carp to a Filipino and they will make it into something delicious. A lot of the bony fishes are our delicacies.
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This might be one of things where the usages vary in different domains or countries. IAANAI (I am also not…) but in the science media that I consume, they make a clear distinction between those two terms. Basically “non-native” (I’ve read) means, “it perhaps was invasive a long time ago, but the ecosystem settled down and has now integrated it with minimal harm”. In contrast, “invasive” means “Oh god we need to wipe this thing out right now because it’s ruining everything”.
Any time Boingers get into a battle over language pedantry, I am reminded that this is a very diverse group from many different countries, industries, domains, and cultures. A great many common words that people are certain they know the definitions of are used completely differently somewhere else.
Let’s give @Socalpubchucker a break on this one. We know what is meant by the words here.
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Revive this classic fad (healthier than Tide pods, mostly):
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Lots of the grumbling about eating asian carp centers on the bones.
In this era of modern industrial automation I ecpext there is a mechanism that can rapidly x-ray a fish filet, then automatically extract the bones mechanically. If we were willing to make the investment of course.
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Or just turn it into a goo, like they do with Chicken McNuggets.
Heck, if they could make it taste as good as a nugget, I’d be all for it.
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If it was just linguistic nitpicking, sure. In this case, it’s an important distinction with practical implications.
Common carp are an invasive species by any definition of the term. Saying that they aren’t invasive because they aren’t as damaging as big head carp is kinda like saying congestive heart failure isn’t a disease compared to having one’s hair and clothes on fire. Sure, one is more immediately dangerous than the other, but that doesn’t mean the other is OK.
Common carp cause environmental damage across most if not all of their range in North America. In the Great Lakes, it’s kind of a mixed bag, since they eat invasive species like zebra mussels and gobys but they also eat native species like crayfish. They also tend to spawn in large numbers in clay and mud shallows, causing significant erosion and turbidity.
Out west, they compete with endangered (juvenile) white sturgeon in the Columbia watershed for many of the same food sources - freshwater clams and crayfish. Where they co-exist with (endangered) salmon and (endangered) steelhead, they eat eggs right from the redd. A carp can cruise in and wipe out an entire salmon redd because it is perfectly suited to Hoover up the gravel that salmonids spawn in and pick the eggs out while spitting out the rocks.
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I’ve kept carp in the form of goldfish, which incidentally still can get up to a foot in length in good conditions. They’re charming fish, but you know what you keep with them? Nothing. Not most other kinds of fish – except koi, which are common carp – and definitely not snails, not shrimp, not plants. Because sooner or later they will find and pick apart anything.
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Carpe diem!
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A Gefilte McNugget? I am sure someone somewhere has done that.
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