Gomers -- What's going wrong

SMALL-TOWN IMPACT: An early morning fire last Monday destroyed an icon business in Marquette, a Northeast Iowa tourist-destination town. The blaze destroyed the 140-year-old Marquette Hardware Store antique store that long has been a popular visitor attraction while being operated by the same family for the last 69 years. Altogether, four buildings were lost in the village's downtown and five families were displaced.

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BIG, BAD CARP MOVE NORTH: Invasive Asian carp - not the common carp - are spawning farther upstream in the Mississippi River than previously documented - as far as Pool 9, which borders Allamakee County in Northeast Iowa. If they prove they can thrive in the Upper Mississippi River, the potential impact is not good. The species - actually, four types - compete for food with game fish and lower water quality, thus also hurting the fishing industry. They already are a nuisance in the Illinois River and have been found in several interior Iowa rivers, including the Cedar and Iowa.

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LONG, SLOW THAW: The frozen-pipe problem that has affected so many homeowners, businesses and local governments in Eastern Iowa through the late stages of a long, bitterly cold winter is so extensive - and spring's arrival has been so slow to date - that it may be mid-April before all of the pipes are running free of ice again.

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