The District has been informed that it appears there is a minor fish loss occurring in the East Lake. Solitude Lake Management was on site earlier this week. Below is the report from Solitude Lake Management Regional Manager, Erin Stewart:
It appears that currently there is a minor fish loss occurring in the East Lake. There are a variety of fish species that are along the furthest East shoreline that appear to be recently deceased or currently distressed. They are mostly green sunfish, a few black crappie, and a couple gizzard shad and common carp.
These lakes have very poor water quality and we have been battling the algae in these lakes for years. When we were out there early last week and did complete a treatment to try to help control the bloom but were only able to use a low rate due to the low oxygen concentrations that were present.
Based on the current conditions it appears that the cool temperatures overnight and this morning induced a “turn-over” event which mixed the lower temperature low dissolved oxygen water through the column leading to the kill.
On 9/8/21 the Dissolved Oxygen at the surface was 7.82mg/L but at 3 meters was 1mg/L and it was close to zero (0.18 mg/L) at the bottom (3.6m) . Fish really need DO concentrations of >5mg/L to avoid stress impacts. If this low DO water from the bottom mixed through the water column, it would likely bring down.
Unfortunately, it may get worse before it gets better. It looks like the West side of the East Lake doesn’t have any fish loss present so, likely the aeration system is helping there. But please update us on the conditions if you get feedback from the community over the weekend. There are quite a few pelicans present that appear to be helping “remove” the fish as they die.