I fished a lot the past few weeks and after many years of fishing, I have never seen the water in Indiana lakes look this bad.  Each lake I have been to has been either muddy or full of scum on top of the water.  At one popular lake we went to (Waveland) we counted at least 100 dead fish floating around the lake.  I also noticed a few floaters at Brookville which was also muddy.  Another lake that was bad was Salmonie.  It was just like fishing pea soup.  And on it goes with all the other lakes we have fished (Monroe, Raccoon, Lemon, Glenn Flint, Eagle Creek, Cataract, Patoka, Wawasee......)  

 

We have been discussing it with other Indiana fisherman but have yet to hear a definitive answer.  Some say it's caused by farm pesticide run off, others say it was the weird weather we had at the beginning of the year.  The only thing I heard that sounded concrete came from an Army Core engineer.  She said that the water she has looked at has had low levels of oxygen caused by an unknown source and it may make the blue green algae a big problem later in the year. 

 

Has anyone heard what the deal is with the water?

 

Have you had an unusual amount of rainfall lately?

 

Roger

3 minutes ago, RoLo said:

 

Have you had an unusual amount of rainfall lately?

 

Roger

We have had some but not tons in every area.  When I checked the averages for IN, we had about 2 inches in April, 7 inches in May and about 3+ inches for June.  So nothing out of the ordinary. 

 

I was hoping you'd say yes, because runoff can certainly cause this, but it may be more involved.

 

Roger

Believe mostly weather related in some form or fashion depending on timing. Heavy rainfall early in the year (and cool), but recently it’s been hot and dry, and that is always a good trigger for algae growth and blooms. Several state reservoirs have already put out blue-green warnings.

 

Specifically, Waveland has a history of fish kills, so no surprise there, but some of your observations mentioned don’t add up. The good news is the bass fishing has been decent on most every lake you listed, with winning weights at 15+ within the past couple weeks for a bunch of them.