4 MIllion Fish Wash Up on Pamlico River Shores

More fish are turning up dead in eastern North Carolina Rivers. Almost 4 million dead fish washed up a long a 3.5 square mile stretch of the Pamlico River yesterday.

The incident happened in the areas of Whichards Beach, down to Broad Creek.

This is the second reported fish kill in the east this week.

The North Carolina Division of Water Quality says it’s hard to say for sure what caused the fish kill unless you can sample the water at the time it happens but they say they can narrow it down to one of three causes.

Environmental Specialist, Jill Paxson explained them as, “High salt, low dissolved oxygen, and high water temperatures.“

Paxson is with the North Carolina Department of Water Quality and said natural forces are more than likely the cause of the massive fish kill.

People who live along the river say yesterday thousands of these fish were floating in the waves or washed up on the shore. Today there’s only a few left. Many have been taken out by the tide or picked up by scavengers.

Paxson says a change in weather would help solve a problem that resurfaces every summer.

“Cooler summers, more wind, a little bit more precipitation would be great,“ said Paxson.

But Tom Stroud with the North Carolina Estuary Museum said pollution can also rob the river of oxygen.

“When you get a lot of run off by taking dirt and soil to the water that makes it more difficult for fish to breathe,” said Stroud.

Stroud said nutrients that form algae can also be a problem.

“When that algae decays, oxygen is used by bacteria consuming that algae and that can create a low oxygen environment.“

Paxson said sensors in the water did pick up on a lack of oxygen late Tuesday night which coincides with when the fish kill likely happened.

As far as swimming or fishing in the Pamlico, Paxson said she has not received any information that would suggest is unsafe to be in the water.