Alward Lake, Clinton County, Michigan Chemical Spill & Fish Kill ?

[MnSportsmanBro]

A couple of days ago, I posted this question to the Warm Waters sub-forum, and got 23 looks, but no replies. So I'm trying here.
As noted below, sorry for the inconvenience of the duplicate posting.


Alward Lake, Clinton County, Michigan Chemical Spill & Fish Kill ?
Alward Lake, Clinton County, Michigan Chemical Spill & Fish Kill ?

I’m trying to confirm a local resident’s statement that a chemical spill killed all large fish in Alward Lake 2-3 years ago.
Is this just a rumor? Has the lake recovered? Can the fish from Alward be eaten safely?



(I will be posting this question on IceFishing forum later on, if need be. Sorry for any inconvenience.)


Thank you.

p.s. I'm contacting DNR as well, but when I searched their site for chemical spills and fish kills, nothing came up. Maybe someone can point me to some place or somone within DNR who knows the history of the local Lansing area. Alward is North of Lansing.

[stillfish]

Wow, i used to live just south of alward and didnt hear about that spill, knowing the dnr they keeped it hush hush... I know its a private lk maybe you should try calling Rose lk reserch and see what they have to say. What chemical was? we used to fish it alot when i was a kid and herd one of the residents on the lake a long time ago planted lake trout in it.....

[USMarine1171]

The only hits I had on a search were links to your threads bout it. Nothing about it on the net or through Google News

[blittle913]

My girlfriend lives right around the corner from this lake so iv driven by it a thousand times and have never seen anyone fishing it. I also have never heard anything about a spill, but then again iv never really asked or talked about it before. I guess the rumor of the spill could be the reason for never seeing anyone out there on it.

[USMarine1171]

Hey,

Maybe it's just a conspiracy some guy made up because there are some hogs in it! Ya never know!

[stillfish]

well, its a private lk so its hard to get access, a guy used to charge 1 dollar to access it frm his property but people on the lk stopped that i guess. But when we were kids used to catch big gills on it but havent fished it in 15 yrs.....

[MnSportsmanBro]

Thanks to all!!

I will follow up with an inquiry to DNR and I will post the results.

My hope is that this is an ugly rumor, and not true.

I will share with you whatever I learn.

Goodcheer!

MnSportsmanbro

[just ducky]

I also live right around the corner from the lake. Yes, it's private, and I've never seen anyone on it although a friend of mine used to fish it years ago. There's no "industry" so to speak around there, so I'm guessing if it was a spill, it was the local farmers that dumped something that got into it. Heck, the farmers around here basically do what they want. I own acreage, and when I bought it in 1989 I thought I walked the whole thing. Several years after we built our house, I found a trash pile in the woods, obviously left by a farmer, and with some pretty scary s#$% in it.

I'm curious though...why would you care? Are you a neighbor? No information in your profile, so I couldn't tell. From your handle (MnSportsmanBro) it sounds like you're in Minnesota?

[MnSportsmanBro]

Dear just ducky, Please don't judge a book by its cover (or should I be writing this note in Quackie?) I am MnSportsmanbro. I now live near the MSU campus in Ingham County. I fish lakes as close as I can get. I saw an old post about Alward and Muskrat, and drove up to talk with local property owners, one of whom told me about a chemical spill, had photos of the kill, but no particulars about the chemical. In his words, it was 'a chemical spill' and not a 'possible' chemical spill as I posted. I simply wanted to know if it's an ugly rumor so I posted a question to the group. Another property owner on the lake confirmed major fish kill a couple of years ago, but didn't know the cause. I'll post what I learn from DNR. What else would you like to know? :confused:

[sarge300]

Let us know what you hear from the DNR , if anything at all from them.

[just ducky]

Dear just ducky, Please don't judge a book by its cover (or should I be writing this note in Quackie?)

Nothing meant in my post at all. Okay, you live in this area near MSU. But you still didn't say why you were so interested? With all due respect, that's a tiny little mudhole of a lake, not connected to public waterways, and with no public access. As I said in my original post, S&#@! goes on all over the rural areas, especially by farmers, that no one but they know about. If we wanna be concerned, be concerned about all of the old gas stations and other contaminated sites around this state that are literally everywhere, and are certainly contaminating someone's drinking water. I understand that spills like this are bad, but if there were a spill, then the local property owners, who may have wells contaminated by it, would be the ones to be concerned, and to contact the DNR. I only live a couple miles from there and I'm not concerned...the lake is landlocked. A spill like this, albeit ugly and killing some fish in a private lake, isn't overly concerning to me.

[Richard Cranium]

Just Ducky....

With the outlet of this lake eventually feeding into Muskrat Lake and is actually some of the head waters of Stony Creek, I wonder if there were any detrimental consequences down stream.
I too used to fish there years ago. There was a family on Alward Rd that even rented boats until some unfortunate accident put a stop to that.
There were some hog fish in there back in the day!

[MnSportsmanBro]

Folks,

To this point, the DNR record shows negative with respect to chemical spill.

More likely a fish kill from some other source (e.g., problems with dissolved oxygen).

I've asked a couple of other questions and I'll post the reply from DNR.

Here is the DNR reply from a kindly DNR Unit Manager in its entirety:

I am unaware of any fish kills in Alward Lake.

If a fish kill is reported, especially from a chemical spill, the DNR and Department of Environmental Quality would be heavily involved. With no industry on the lake, it is highly unlikely that a chemical spill could occur unless it was deliberate.

It is possible that a fish kill occurred. Shallow lakes that are nutrient rich can have dissolved oxygen problems that can kill most the large fish. Big fish require more oxygen, so they typically die first. In a chemical spill, small fish are most sensitive to low concentrations of toxins and all fish will die with high concentrations.


I'll post anything else I learn.

Goodcheer!

MnSportsmanbro

[stillfish]

Was this die-off just after ice out? yrs ago we had a die-off of fish in lk geneva in dewitt, I guess their was some huge musky washed up on shore and lots of bass and pike, They planted that lake with muskey when they made that lk. We used to fish that lk for carp when i was younger, im 39 now and had a blast doing it. Also i think they did a private plant of walleyes their to.

[just ducky]

Just Ducky....

With the outlet of this lake eventually feeding into Muskrat Lake and is actually some of the head waters of Stony Creek, I wonder if there were any detrimental consequences down stream.
I too used to fish there years ago. There was a family on Alward Rd that even rented boats until some unfortunate accident put a stop to that.
There were some hog fish in there back in the day!

Yeah the outlet is a drain, that does eventually connect to Muskrat and I think the Stoney Creek drain system. So I stand corrected...it does feed a drainage system through man-made drains. But the last I knew, that drain coming out of the lake is darn near dry much of the year. In any case, as the post from the DNR said, there's no industry for some distance. So if it did happen, my guess is it was a farmer (as I said before, this I could believe), or just some strange act of deliberate dumping (which also could be possible). People do strange things in the country, like my neighbor down the road who was running an "under the radar" auto fixing shop in his pole barn, and dumping the waste fluids in the field behind his house...that is until the DNR/DEQ got wind of it from all of us neighbors and stuck it to him.

[MnSportsmanBro]

Folks, thanks to all.
I'm pretty much satisfied by a negative DNR report about chemical spill.
Seems most likely one of those cyclical processes that involves dissolved oxygen.
I'm going to leave it at that.
If I learn anything else, I'll post it.
It's a pretty small private pond. I see no public access site. There is a seasonal fishing vendor located at the SW corner, but he's away most of the year, and hasn't been there any time I've been driving by.
I'll keep the forum posted if I learn anything.
In the meantime, Just Ducky gave me some tips about some spots I'm going to give a try. Thanks to Just Ducky and all around.
As my brother says, "Watch your bobber!"
Goodcheer!
MnSportsmanbro