Article courtesy of Reuters

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The Obama administration is proposing a partial closing of locks to the Great Lakes as part of a $78 million plan to keep invasive Asian carp from moving into the lakes from rivers and canals, but the region's governors on Monday said that was not enough.

The White House held a "carp summit" on proposals to block the voracious Bighead and Silver carp that threaten the lakes' $7 billion fisheries as they move up from the Mississippi River watershed.

The Supreme Court last month denied a request by Michigan, Wisconsin, and other states in the region to order a shutdown of the locks and dams that connect to the Great Lakes through a man-made system of canals and rivers created a century ago.

After Monday's White House meeting, Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm said, "We strongly urged them to close the locks until we get a handle on exactly the number of fish and the more permanent solution."

"Ultimately, you have to permanently separate the Great Lakes systems from the other systems. You have to permanently shut the locks down," the Democrat said.

A just-issued 39-page report by federal agencies instead proposed that locks be closed for two to three weeks per month.

The plan, to be paid for with $78 million from Great Lakes restoration funding, also called for expediting construction of a third electric barrier to keep the fish out of the lakes, increasing efforts to fish for and poison the offending carp and enacting strategies to prevent the carp from spawning.

The economic impact of shutting the locks on shippers and recreational boaters has been disputed, but Granholm said the up to $90 million yearly cost would pale next to the "irreparable" damage to commercial and recreational fishing on the lakes if the carp crowd out other species.

Last week Michigan refiled its request with the Supreme Court to order the locks closed after carp DNA was discovered in a Lake Michigan harbor, which may indicate the fish have already reached the lake. However, U.S. officials are not convinced the fish are in the lake, Granholm said.

Granholm said the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will make a recommendation by early March on what will be done next -- though that could change if actual carp are found in the lake.

(Reporting by Andrew Stern, editing by Vicki Allen)