Thousands of dead fish wash up on coast of South Carolina

January 16, 2013 – PAWLEYS ISLAND, SC – There is a mystery along the South Carolina coast. Thousands of dead fish washed up on the beach at the south end of  Pawleys Island Tuesday afternoon. The fish are menhaden, and the SC Department of Natural Resources have been notified of the incident. Menhaden fish are a small, oily fish that are used for fish oil and its oil is also an ingredient in lipstick and they are also used for livestock feed. –WLTX

Mystery intensifies over fish kill: Thousands of Atlantic menhaden – a baitfish that plays a key role in the South Atlantic ecosystem – were found washed up on the beaches in the south area of the Grand Strand on Tuesday and Wednesday, leaving S.C. Department of Natural Resources investigators trying to determine the cause. From DeBordieu, a private community just north of Georgetown, northward to Pawleys Island, a rough estimate of 30,000 to 40,000 menhaden in the 6-to-8 inch range were spread along the beach and first spotted by beachgoers taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather. Researchers from the University of South Carolina’s Belle Baruch Institute for Marine & Coastal Sciences took ocean water samples from where the menhaden washed ashore at DeBordieu and found typical winter conditions in levels such as dissolved oxygen and salinity. A reddish slick was noticed in the water near the beach which researchers found to be decaying fish matter from the dead menhaden. When a fish kill occurs in the ocean, the culprit is often found to be an algal bloom such as red tide, widespread low levels of dissolved oxygen or, especially in the winter, colder-than-normal ocean water temperatures. The testing ruled out an algal bloom and widespread areas of low dissolved oxygen, or hypoxia, and the water temperature is above normal thanks to the recent stretch of warm weather. Mel Bell, Director of the Office of Fisheries Management for S.C. DNR, provided his agency’s theory on the kill. “On Friday we had a new moon (which caused) real high high tides and real low low tides,” said Bell. “Probably what happened was a school (of menhaden) got in an area of water on a high tide, in a hole or depression, and at low tide they were trapped and depleted the oxygen in the water. Then, all the fish would suffocate.  “We don’t know for certain, but given the results of the water sample analysis and the tides, that’s probably the best working hypothesis. Then when the tide came back in, it washed the dead fish out and they washed up on the beach.” –MBO