Just three days before Paul McCartney takes the stage at Piedmont Park, Lake Clara Meer looks, and mostly smells, as good as new.
Workers have completed scooping out the fish who died over the weekend from an oxygen-depriving algae bloom, said Piedmont Park Conservancy Vice-President Monica Thornton. The nonprofit, which oversees the park, continues to monitor the lake, she said.
Thornton said the cleanup was completed in less than two days because of volunteers and workers.
“We’ve been overwhelmed by the support,” she said.
The massive fish deaths shocked passers-by and set off a flurry of speculation as to what caused the incident.
Thornton said that the conservancy has consulted with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources to determine the cause the deaths. DNR has met with the conservancy’s lake management group and said the deaths were the result of a naturally occurring algae bloom, she said.
The deaths occur as algae can quickly multiply, especially in hot, dry weather. If not controlled, the algae eventually dies and takes oxygen with it, said fisheries biologist Chris Nelson of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.
Piedmont Park Conservancy’s executive vice president is also named Chris Nelson.
DNR spokesperson Robin Hill said the agency was told by workers from the conservancy and lake management group on-site that the lake was sprayed last Thursday, Aug. 6; however, it’s unknown what might have been sprayed and for what reason. DNR was unable to confirm that report, she said.
“I don’t think you can definitively say what caused it,” Hill said. “All we know is when we got there, the oxygen levels were almost non-existent.”
Thornton said she was unaware that the lake management group, which has overseen Lake Clara Meer for the past eight years, may have sprayed the lake last week. However, DNR has given the conservancy no indication that a such an occurrence may have caused the deaths, nor that the lake is unsafe for fishing, she said.
Testing showed that oxygen levels had begun to rebound by Monday, Hill added.
Thornton said the conservancy will conduct its annual fisheries study within the next few months.
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