By Louie Stout

By now you’ve probably heard about the fish kill at Diamond Lake that occurred earlier this month.

Based on best guess estimates, it affected about 1,000 fish of several different species.

It’s still under investigation by the Michigan DNR Fisheries and the Department of Environment and Great Lakes and Energy (EAGLE), formerly known as Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ).

Don’t expect much to come out of this investigation. Fisheries Biologist Matt Diana was at Diamond last week and said the fish he saw had already begun decomposing, too late for any analysis.

“We’ve been getting a lot of calls from people around the lake; as the winds shift dead fish move from one shore to the other,” he said. “It’s difficult to determine what killed them or how many, but I can say that it wasn’t a major kill and shouldn’t have a big impact on fish populations.”

Dead fish showed up two days after the lake had been treated with chemicals to kill non-native vegetation.

Diana wouldn’t single out the chemical application as the sole cause, but said it may have contributed to it.

Chemicals had been applied on aquatic plants in the area near Park Shore Marina two days before the dead fish were first reported in that part of the lake.

The treatment was legal and done within the permit issued by the Michigan EAGLE division.

Diana said the chemical used (legally) was diqat flumioxazin, known to be good for killing stubborn exotic plants. However, the chemical also can be hard on fish.

“We had a long winter and an elongated spawning season which puts a lot of stress on fish, triggers parasites and leads to mortality,” he said. “If the fish are heavily stressed out, the chemical treatments can contribute to that mortality.”

Call it the perfect storm; a storm that has been occurring for years each spring/early summer on several Michiana lakes.

Citizens may be irked by floating dead fish, but anglers are equally concerned with a bigger and growing problem – an ongoing and oftentimes excessive destruction of fish habitat.

Let’s not get ahead ourselves by pointing fingers at the credible applicators that are doing their jobs to treat non-native plants, such as milfoil, starry stonewort and curly leaf pondweed.

Some treatments are necessary. There are shallow areas of lakes that get so weed choked that boats can’t get through them. When non-native plants get out of control and allowed to spread, they create serious problems. They have to be kept in check.

However, you can blame overzealous lake groups that insist on carpet bombing vegetation offshore and on big, shallow flats that serve as fish nurseries and pose little or no navigation issues.

They get away with it because state governments and their flimsy regulations allow a lot of “fudge factor” in how permits are issued and implemented.

Lake groups tell applicators where and how much they want killed. Applicators fill out permit forms, send to the DNR offices outside of fish management, and most of those get rubber stamped with very little oversight.

Granted, laws do limit the scope of treatments and the type of chemicals to be used. But the laws offer some wiggle room that well financed lake associations capitalize upon.

Fisheries biologists have little to say about it, and sometimes when they do, they are overruled. They won’t admit it publicly, but many find the issue very frustrating.

Michigan’s situation is even more pathetic. While Indiana biologists do have some oversight, Michigan’s Fisheries Division’s hands are tied. Permits are handled outside their jurisdiction and controlled by state legislation.

Let’s hope that the Diamond incident will open people’s eyes as to what really is going on. TV reports indicate some Diamond residents are outraged and are now questioning the reasoning behind what many believe to be overzealous treatments. If there’s one lake in Michiana that doesn’t have a weed problem – except for very few of its backwaters - it’s Diamond.

Residents on other lakes are starting to ask questions, too. Diana said his office has been receiving more questions from southwest Michigan residents who are asking more questions about the chemicals going into the waters and amount of money associations are spending on it.

But let’s be real. To really affect change, anglers and the general public need to pressure their elected officials who have allowed this to go on far too long.