Second Phase of Invasive Fish to be removed from Llanelli

Environment Agency Wales annoucned today the Second phase of invasive fish eradication programme for lakes in Llanelli.

Environment Agency Wales will begin work next week on the second phase of a large scale eradication programme to remove a non-native, invasive fish species from three lakes in Llanelli.

Officers will be applying a chemical that kills fish (piscicide) to the lakes at the Millennium Coastal Park in Carmarthenshire, after successfully eradicating topmouth gudgeon from two other lakes at the park late last year.

From next week, the Agency will begin preliminary work to drain down the lakes and rescue the native fish.   During the operation some paths within the Millennium Coastal Park will be closed in order to allow the Agency safe access to the Lakes.

The Agency and Carmarthenshire County Council are asking members of the public to adhere to these closures which will be in place for three weeks.

Phil Morgan, from Environment Agency Wales said:

“Before Christmas we successfully removed topmouth gudgeon from two lakes in Llanelli where they posed a serious risk to our native fish stocks.

“During this next phase we hope to eradicate the remaining populations of topmouth gudgeon from the coastal park, and thereby removing one of the three established colonies in Wales.

“It’s important now that people take extra care to make sure the species is not reintroduced. If anyone notices any suspicious activity relating to the movement of fish they should report it immediately via our incident hotline on 0800 80 70 60.”

Carmarthenshire executive board member for leisure services Cllr Meryl Gravell said:

“The Environment Agency programme will help us restore the lakes within the park in time to a healthy fishery that will enable us to engage with fishing clubs to help police and future manage the well being of the lakes.”

Topmouth gudgeon is a small freshwater fish from Asia, which was brought to Europe accidentally in the 1960’s through the importation of other fish.

It is a highly damaging species which often goes unnoticed due to its small size, but can rapidly populate ponds, lakes and streams.

It has the ability to dominate a habitat and food supply, often leading to a decline in numbers of native fish.

Millennium Coastal Park is one of 23 established populations of topmouth gudegon in England and Wales.

This programme is being delivered in line with the Welsh Government and DEFRA objective to totally eradicate topmouth gudgeon at all of these sites by 2017.

The Environment Agency is the enforcing authority for the Import of Live Fish Act and has a duty to take action to contain, manage and where appropriate, eradicate high risk invasive non-native species.

More information about invasive species please visit www.nonnativespecies.org