The eradication of northern snakehead fish, an invasive species discovered in eastern Arkansas this past spring, will be the subject of a town hall meeting and public hearing at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Brinkley Convention Center.

     Arkansas Game and Fish Commission and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service staff will be on hand to present information about the fish, an invasive species from Asia that could threaten native fish populations in Arkansas and elsewhere in the lower Mississippi River basin.

     The first part of the meeting will outline the need to protect the Piney Creek watershed from the fish, which eat sport fish and can survive in a wide variety of habitats and temperatures. AGFC biologists will present information and answer questions during the first part of the meeting. The second part of the meeting will be a hearing open to public comments about the Piney Creek Environmental Assessment that is required under the National Environmental Policy Act.

     Northern snakeheads were discovered in the Piney Creek drainage in Lee and Monroe counties in April. Since then, AGFC has been assessing the infestation and developing a plan to control their spread to waterways outside the Piney Creek drainage.

     An eradication plan originally scheduled for October has been postponed until late winter or early spring 2009. Recent heavy rainfall associated with tropical storm systems Gustav and Ike has caused higher-than-normal water flows in Piney Creek, limiting AGFC’s ability to effectively implement the eradication plan. Weather conditions also have delayed rice harvest in many fields adjacent to Piney Creek, another factor that has hampered AGFC’s ability to move ahead with the eradication project this fall.

     “These storms have really thrown us a curveball,” said Mike Armstrong, AGFC fisheries division chief. “We had a small window after the rice harvest and before landowners started pumping up fields for duck season, and the heavy rainfall we’ve experienced has closed that window.”

      “The rice fields adjacent to the creek have to be dry for us to proceed with the eradication project, and right now they’re not,” Armstrong added. “The water flowing through Piney Creek is also much higher than it needs to be for us to effectively execute our eradication plan.”

     Although the eradication project has been delayed, Thursday’s meeting will be the final opportunity for the public to comment on the Piney Creek Environmental Assessment. Comments on the Environmental Assessment will become part of the public record as required by the National Environmental Policy Act.

     The Environmental Assessment is available at http://www.fws.gov/arkansas-es/. Copies may be requested by calling (501) 513-4470; by fax, (501) 513-4480; by e-mail, Mark_Sattelberg@fws.gov; or by mail, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Ecological Services Field Office, 110 S. Amity Road, Conway, AR 72032.

     For more information about the meeting, call Keith Stephens at the AGFC Little Rock office at (501) 223-6342 or Mark Sattelberg at the USFWS Conway Field Office at (501) 513-4470.