Later, in the 1970s, the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission found a use for silver and bighead carp. The Clean Water Act had just been passed, and local governments were under pressure to comply with the new standards. But a lot of communities couldn’t afford to upgrade their sewage-treatment plants. The Game and Fish Commission thought that stocking carp in treatment ponds might help. The carp would reduce the nutrient load in the ponds by consuming the algae that thrived on the excess nitrogen.
