Channel catfish dead on Lake Zumbro 7/26/2010 4:45

Channel catfish dead on Lake Zumbro
7/26/2010 4:45:36 PM
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Post-Bulletin staff
ORONOCO — Several hundred channel catfish, some weighing up to 10 pounds, were found dead in Lake Zumbro over the weekend.

The Department of Natural Resources received several calls about it on Monday and sent out a crew to check it out, said Kevin Stauffer, area DNR fisheries supervisor.

Because the fish were badly decomposed, the officials couldn’t get any fish to send to St. Paul for toxicological studies, he said. The DNR will send out another crew on Tuesday, he said, hoping to find fish that can be studied.

Because only channel catfish were found dead, it would appear they were killed by some kind of disease specific to them, he said.

More to come as I hear more, not a good deal

man is that what that smell was?? i was down there yesterday and it stunk like no other… it was unbareable and the bugs were crazy bad after dark. hope to hear more info about this in the furure

Thanks for the post. Doesn’t sound good. Lets hope that the DNR can find out what caused it.
Thanks, Bill

The kill has been determined to be one of a bacterial nature ad it was likely spurred by a rapid rise in water temp. Apparently it was specific to certain size classes of the catfish and other species’ of fish were not affected.
This is good news.