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L/FOG Temp: 36 °F Wind: CLM at 0 mph Friday, December 6, 2002 SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map EXTRA HomeLife Magazine W3 Magazine Jobs @ Mail Tribune Tempo A & E Oregon CarZone Wellness Connection Real Estate Newspaper in Education Prime Times Outdoor Journal Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People CLASSIFIEDS Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Find Everything E SOUTHERN OREGON Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar ABOUT US FAQ What's New Advertise Home Delivery Classified Ad Contact Us Media Kit Email Story to a Friend December 5, 2002 Natural die-off at Hyatt Lake leaves a deadly trail of trout By MARK FREEMAN Mail Tribune ASHLAND — When the morning breeze whisked a rotten stench off the surface of Hyatt Lake on July 25, Billy Dean thought nothing of it. When midsummer hot spells like that one grip the South Cascades, the shallow reservoir east of Ashland often swells with mats of green algae that generate quite an odor as they die and rot. "It didn’t seem any different than it normally does," recalls Dean, who runs the Campers Cove resort along the lakeshore. "It was atrocious, but it’s atrocious every summer." But that July’s smell signaled a different atrocity that has left a deadly mark on Hyatt Lake. The rotting algae generated a massive die-off of Hyatt’s famed rainbow trout to an extent that only now is coming to light. The natural die-off killed an estimated nine out of 10 trout in the lake, whose reputation as a prime spot for big fall trout has taken a hit that may take years to overcome. When the die-off occurred, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife biologists estimated only 1,000 to 2,000 dead trout littered the banks. The biologists were unclear how many more lay dead on the lake bottom. But nets set last month during ODFW’s annual trout survey caught 90 percent fewer fish than average, sporting only seven trout all 11 to 16 inches long. "It looks like it has turned out to be a significant die-off," says David Haight, one of the ODFW biologists surveying Hyatt Lake. "We were hopeful that maybe it wasn’t too bad, but it looks like it was." And it also looks like it could take several years to reverse. The lake is normally planted each spring with fingerling trout that take at least two years to grow into the 16- to 18-inch rainbows that draw anglers from the Rogue Valley and beyond. The quickest fix for the lake would be planting several thousand legal-sized trout next spring. But there’s no extra ODFW money to grow the extra fish. Besides, Haight says, it takes two years to grow a trout from an egg to the 8-inch size of legals. So biologists hope to skim a few thousand legals from several area lakes to get more fish stocked in Hyatt this spring, Haight says. "We’ll just have to grab a few here and a few there, to make sure other lakes don’t suffer because of it," he says. Lakes like Hyatt often suffer from die-offs that occur when a natural mix of warm water and sunlight turns deadly. Diamond Lake farther north, in Douglas County, is famous for such blooms. They also are common occurrences in small ponds throughout the Rogue Valley floor. Midsummer heat scorched the lake to 74 degrees, creating a mass bloom of green algae that started dying around July 20. As the organic matter died and rotted, it sucked the water’s dissolved oxygen, which fish need to breathe. On land, Dean was more entranced by the thick smoke from Southern Oregon’s new wildfires to notice. "The smoke was so thick you couldn’t see between the trees," Dean says. "I didn’t notice anything at all about the lake, until I saw the dead fish." On July 25, the first of the dead trout started to surface on the lake’s southern end. By the next morning, the banks were littered with the dead fish, while sick and dying ones finned lazily on the surface as the stench of rotting fish and decaying plant life hung over the water. Tests done that day showed a surface temperature of 74 degrees and dissolved oxygen levels of just 2.6 parts per million. Levels of at least 4 parts per million are considered the minimum for trout survival. Ten of the live fish were collected, killed, packed in ice and shipped by Greyhound to an ODFW pathology lab in Corvallis for examination, which turned up no diseases. By the weekend came the birds. "We had cormorants, pelicans, seagulls, ospreys and a huge flock of vultures all move in," Dean says. "Within two days, all the dead fish were gone." Dean and others didn’t give the die-off a second thought. Midsummer fishing is normally slow anyway, so poor catches in August didn’t startle anyone. But then came September and October, when fall fly-fishing for large trout can be fantastic at Hyatt Lake. But this fall, the trout weren’t there. "Usually, the fall is so good, so it struck me as kind of funny when the fishing was so poor," Dean says. Poor fishing now means poor lakeside businesses like Campers Cove, which normally heads into the Christmas season with a $60,000 cushion, Dean says. This year, it’s zilch. Hyatt next spring will get its complement of 200,000 to 250,000 fingerling rainbow trout, plus all the excess legal-sized trout Haight and others can glean from other lakes. "It comes down to re-evaluating and re-prioritizing to see where you can get the biggest bang for your buck," says Steve Denney, the ODFW’s southwest regional supervisor in Roseburg. Locally, Lost Creek and Applegate lakes are the biggest receptacles for legal-sized trout, which are stocked because fingerlings planted there turn into bass food. Haight says his agency is leery about stocking excess salmon or steelhead at Hyatt, as is done in other lakes. The salmon and steelhead are more apt than trout to swim over Hyatt’s small dam and mill around downstream with the Jenny Creek basin’s rare redband trout, Haight says. Dean says the lake needs a good complement of fish next spring, so the only midsummer stench at Hyatt Lake next year is the annual algae bloom and not the death of his business. "Our campground wasn’t full one day last year," Dean says. "We can’t have another year like this last one. We need some help." Reach reporter Mark Freeman at 776-4470, or e-mail [email protected] Printer Friendly Version Email Story to a Friend Subscribe Archive: Click to Search M Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright 1997-2002 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. 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