(Lake Park)—The Iowa Department of Natural Resources is monitoring a fish kill on Silver Lake at Lake Park. DNR Fisheries Biologist Mike Hawkins tells KUOO news its affecting white bass…(click here for comment.)
“Well what we’re seeing is several thousand fish, so it’s a fairly significant chunk of the population probably there. It’s probably not coming as too much of a surprise. It’s a very large year class of fish, about the same age. They’re all five years old, so sometimes when these populations give off very large year classes like that they can become more susceptible to disease later in life. And that’s what we assume is happening there, that they’ve contracted some kind of bacterial or viral infection.”
Hawkins says it doesn’t pose a risk to humans and will likely not impact other fish species…(click here for comment.) “Normally disease or viruses and bacteria in fish are not transmissible to humans so there should be no human impact. It might be a little unsightly on the shorelines there for a little while, but homeowners can take care of that by just either burying those fish along the shoreline or on their property or adding them to a compost pile or something of that nature.”
Hawkins says the worse of the kill may already be over. He says quite a few of the fish that have been washing up are partially decomposed.
