Arkansas Greeted by 20 Miles of Dead Fish In 2011

From DATELINE ZERO – Damn. That’s all that really comes to mind. Simply: “Damn.”

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What the heck’s going on, Arkansas? If this is all going to be chalked up to weather, someone let Destro into Arkansas with a fish-and-game-killing version of his weather dominator.

Arkansas Game & Fish is trying to figure out why 100,000 fish in Northwest Arkansas turned up dead. They were found along a 20-mile stretch between the Ozark Dam and Highway 109 Bridge in Franklin County.

The 20-mile stretch along the Arkansas River where an estimated 100,000 drum fish were found washed ashore and floating looks much different now.

Keith Stephens with Game and Fish explains, “We got a call last week from a tug boat operator that found the fish out on the river along the bank, in the river channel and we immediately dispatched somebody to the area to take a look.”

Investigators from local and state agencies took samples from the affected area. Stephens says fish kills occur every year, but the magnitude of this one is unusual, and disease could be the cause.

A pollutant would have affected cross species. Stephens says, “Ninety-nine percent of them were Drum, which is a bottom feeder. It’s not a game fish in Arkansas.”

Some fish collected were alive and visibly sick. They have been taken to the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff for testing.
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The Arkansas Game & Fish Commission is also investigating thousands of dead birds in Beebe.

–Today’s THV, “Dead fish cover 20-miles of Arkansas River”