Bighead (no, grass carp) up the Fox

A dead bighead carp was found floating on the Fox River near Montgomery on Saturday. Upon farther review, as the commenter noted, and several professionals agreed, it is a grass carp.

Don Rego, president of the Illinois Smallmouth Alliance, reported the find. He said the IDNR will be notified within a day of the 36-inch carp.

The Dayton Dam had been considered a block to the advance of Asian carp–bigheads and silvers–on the Fox from the Illinois River. Many are stacked up below the Dayton Dam.

A floating dead carp doesn’t necessarily signify anything. It could be a rogue fish or a bad joke by an angler who snagged it at Dayton or Starved Rock and took it upstream.

Or as it apparently turned out, be a grass carp.