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Japan in culinary offensive to stop spread of US fish | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited

The keepers of Japan's biggest lake have called on the public to join in one final push to eat the bluegill fish - possibly the most reviled creature in Japan - into extinction before it does the same to threatened native species.

The bluegill's steady destruction of indigenous freshwater fish, almost 50 years after it was touted as a vital source of protein for an undernourished population, is being treated as an ecological emergency and has provoked a rare public show of contrition from Emperor Akihito. As crown prince, Akihito received bluegill as a gift from the then mayor of Chicago, Richard J Daley, during a visit to the US in 1960.