Before I even got onto the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, I found myself outside the office of Illinois Marine Towing in Lemont, Ill., talking to some of the deck hands who were scheduled to start work that morning, and would remain at work for three weeks.  Crews on the tugboats that push barges up and down the waterways live on the boats for three weeks at a time, sometimes four if they’d like to earn a bit more money, before coming home for a few weeks.  There are a lot of moving parts in the discussion about Asian carp and the Great Lakes, and these people who make their living working on the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal are a part of that debate, as is the cargo that they help to push up and down the waterways.

See the rest of the photos after the jump!