Natoma lake die off?

My kids go on nature walks with their school down to Negro Bar. I'm told that there are a ton of dead fish down there big and small....Anybody know anything about it?

Interested to learn more about this.

They have been releasing 7000+ cfs in the evenings. When I was there last week there were 10's of thousands of dead minnows floating in the current. I saw one dieing trout too. We talked about the trout. We think it was deep in the lake and went through the outlet. Went from 200' to basically 0' feet in seconds which caused barotrauma. Possibly the same for the bait. There is lots of dead bait on the shoreline from when the water resides every day leaving it on shore.

This is just speculation....


Look at the folsom lake outflow temp and volume. It looks like the "die off" is associated with a drop in temp. I suspect that Folsom started dumping water from lower in the column so that water temps would meet hatchery demands/salmon spawning demands.

If this is the case, then fish could be a. Dying from barotrauma or B. dying from hypoxia if Folsom is releasing deep hypoxic water.

That's my wild ass guess.

If people make a big fuss about it, then I may get a call to take water quality probes out there and I would have a better answer for you. That being said, please don't make a fuss about it. 


Also, the minnows are Japanese pond smelt aka Wakasagi aka Wakawaka.

Thanks for the info. 

 

This is just speculation....


Look at the folsom lake outflow temp and volume. It looks like the "die off" is associated with a drop in temp. I suspect that Folsom started dumping water from lower in the column so that water temps would meet hatchery demands/salmon spawning demands.

If this is the case, then fish could be a. Dying from barotrauma or B. dying from hypoxia if Folsom is releasing deep hypoxic water.

That's my wild ass guess.

If people make a big fuss about it, then I may get a call to take water quality probes out there and I would have a better answer for you. That being said, please don't make a fuss about it. 


Also, the minnows are Japanese pond smelt aka Wakasagi aka Wakawaka.

Megs called it in man!!!!!