NC Division of Water Quality investigated fish kill at Jordan Lake

Date: Tue, 2 Aug 2011 12:59:04 -0400
From: Haw River Assembly
Subject: DWQ investigated fish kill at Jordan Lake

I wanted to pass along to the Chatlist information I received from Danny Smith, supervisor of  the Raleigh Regional Office for the Division of Water Quality (DWQ), about the recent fish kill seen at Jordan Lake.

Staff  from his office investigated the fish kill on Friday, July 29 and estimated about 100 dead striped bass. They concluded it was due to thermal conditions – high water temperatures and low oxygen, which stripers are sensitive to. Striped bass are stocked at Jordan Lake for recreational fishing.   He echoed my comments that it is not a good idea to swim where a fish kill is evident, even if the cause of death was climate related, since you could be exposed to dangerous bacteria as the fish decompose.

I was very impressed that this DWQ Regional Office  responded so quickly, to citizen concerns when they are trying to do more with less resources.  The legislature voted this session to cut the budget for Dept. of Environment and Natural Resources  by 33% , and the regional offices took a particularly hard hit.

Elaine Chiosso
Haw Riverkeeper
Haw River Assembly
P.O.Box 187
Bynum NC 27228
(919) 542-5790

www.hawriver.org

3 Comments

  1. We were out on Jordan Lake today and there seemed to be a lot more than 100 dead fish.

    Can we organize a cleanup to get them out of the water before the bacteria gets out of hand?

  2. Thanks for this post. I did an open water swim last week in Jordan Lake, and woke later that night throwing up. I’ve felt very sick after eating since the swim, and I’ve suspected that my issue was linked to the water quality. The guardsman was clear that a few bass had died as a result of the heat, but didn’t see to think that the swim there would be a risk. Again, thanks for the post.

  3. NOT UNTIL NC’S LEADERS CURTAIL URBAN DEVELOPMENT WILL JORDAN LAKE AND FALLS LAKE WATERSHEDS BECOME SAFE AND HEALTHY.

    By 2006 NC DENR revealed to development interests its then-proposed nutrient regulations for both watersheds which weren’t adopted until Juune 2009. This gave development interests nearly three+ years to end-run the rules. They did this by relying upon the 1971 recodification of NC’s Extraterritorial Jurisdiction (ETJ) law, 160A-360. This law granted exclusive control of rural land to municipal governments while simultaneously denying voting rights to property owners. What has this cahnge to do with Jordan Lake’s contamination? Everything!

    After 1971 development interests steadily infiltrated local and county government and, consequently, continued to benefit for four decades thereafter from urban growth via the “involuntary annexation of rural land” to ensure urban growth and profitability.

    Four decades later, cotinuing development now must rely upon rural land to serve as “giant sponges” for burgeoning drinking water contamination of both watersheds from urban run-off (of nitrogen and phosphorus). Do achieve this, farms must cease to exist and rural land returned to forest land.

    Both Jordan and Falls Lake watersheds are already “full up”. NC’s leaders know this. But see no solution, especially whereas development interests have ruled NC ever since. And continue to advertise nationwise, “MOVE TO NC’s PIEDMONT!”. Thus, an additional 500,000 carpetbaggers are expected between 2012-2020 to arrive by 2020. When by summer 2010 195 experts testified to DENR that “there’s already insufficient potable water for the reion’s existing population; and no existing or anticipated technology available to sufficiently address this crisis.

    The Piedmont will require an additional 30% potable water and 50% more food by 2020. Yet the solution for unprecedented, irreversible drinking water contamination remains to bankrupt Piedmont farmers so that their land can be returned to forest so that, in turn, tree roots can filter contaminants before accumulating further in these watersheds.

    Folks, wake up! You’ve elected officials at every level of NC government who continue to diregard your health and safety so that private interests may continue to benefit — in the Piedmont and throughout the Triad counties — 24 in all.

    Yes! Keep the Jordan Lake (and Falls Lake) Rules. But until unrestrained development — which the EPA concluded by 2001 was and remains the #1 cause of NC’s drinking water contamination crisis — is curtailed, NC’s future is severely imparied.

    The problem for the McCrory administration remains: How to satisfy the devil while resolving this crisis! Frankly, it’s impossible. His administration must rely upon “Big $$$” to get re-elected! And the legislature has long been ruled by development interests within both parties!

    As one NCSU expert testified during DENR’s 2010 hearings, “Unless NC changes its laws and policies now, it will take the Piedmont region watersheds decades, if not centuries, to recover.”

    And we have only ourselves to blame! Rural residents and farm owners have had absolutely no representation as regards related matters from inception. Their Constitutional rigihts were denied when related regulations were adopted in 1971 and again in 2009. By necessity, urban residents have been kept in the dark. And corrupted officials within targeted counties have routinely relied upon NC’s ETJ laws to pursue their largely hidden agendes.

    Before NC’s legislature, administrators and agency heads, the NC Farm Coalition has represented 10,000+ NC citizens who already have been irreparably harmed, including having lost their homes and livelihoods, as a direct result of the forementioned. Don’t you think it’s time that this ceases? Before NC becomes the next New Jersey of the United States!

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