In doing so, they poisoned the water supply and quite probably the short-term economic outlook for the small town of Portola. It was a terrible thing to do. It was the right thing to do.
Pike are torpedo-shaped fish with jaws filled with wicked teeth.
They eat anything they can fit into their mouths, including fish, frogs, snakes, and ducklings. In the Midwest, where pike are native, anglers often fish for them using small mammals as bait. Unfortunately, some years ago, a misguided individual illegally released these predators into Davis Lake. Since the lake is connected to the Sacramento River system, the crucial habitat for the state's salmon, biologists feared that pike would eventually reach this area and decimate salmon populations. To prevent this, the pike had to be eliminated, and poisoning was the only sure way to do this.