Laura Snider

High temps, low water killed 263 Boulder Creek fish

September 16, 2009 · Posted by in Environment 
A dead fish lies on the bank of Boulder Creek just west of 28th Street last month | Paul Aiken

A dead fish lies on the bank of Boulder Creek just west of 28th Street last month | Paul Aiken

The 263 dead fish found scattered on the banks of Boulder Creek last month were killed by a combination of high temperatures and low water flows.

Sections of Boulder Creek were just a trickle on Aug. 20 — with water flowing by the Millennium Harvest House at only 1 cubic foot per second — because of high demand by area water uses. And the high temps pulled the oxygen out of the streamflow that was left.

From today’s Daily Camera:

Carol Ellinghouse, water resources coordinator for the city of Boulder, said a natural — but dramatic — decrease of about 20 cfs was measured in Boulder Creek’s flow at Boulder Falls on Aug. 20.

She called the drop an unusual “natural phenomenon” but couldn’t say specifically what might have caused it. Officials traveled upstream of Barker Dam in Nederland to see if there had been any illegal diversions of water but found none, she said.

Ellinghouse said the state water commissioner for Boulder Creek, who controls how much water is diverted by rights holders along the waterway, was unable to react quickly enough to the sudden drop in stream flow Aug. 20 to prevent the fish kill.

“It was a very dramatic drop,” she said. “He assumed there was a larger influx of water into the river.”

Read the full story at DailyCamera.com or learn more about fish kills in Boulder after the jump.

Fish kills in Boulder Creek are not all that common since the city of Boulder donated some of its senior water rights to the creek’s in-stream flow more than a decade ago, which essentially ensures that water won’t drop below a certain level in the stream.

But in South Boulder Creek, which flows from Gross Reservoir through Eldorado State Park, fish kills are much more common — there are no effective in-stream water rights for that creek. The cities of Boulder and Lafayette, however, are working to change that as part of a negotiation to expand the reservoir. Read more about plans to protect South Boulder Creek at BigGreenBoulder.com.

Read more posts about water resources on BigGreenBoulder:

Denver is planning to nearly triple the size of Gross Reservoir in southern Boulder County.Build more dam, save more fish

 The proposed Flaming Gorge Pipeline would pipe water from the Green Rvier in Wyoming to the Front Range.Front Range thirst for Colo. River water leads to increasingly bizarre plans

Tags: , , , ,

Tip Jar

Like what we're doing? Got a spare sawbuck? Help us pay for site maintenance and reporting and we'll think happy thoughts about you sometimes. $100 gets you a personal, paperless thank-you video from Dave and Laura! $500 gets you... five personal, paperless thank-you videos from Dave and Laura and a tote bag!

One Response to “High temps, low water killed 263 Boulder Creek fish”

  1. Boulder man dresses in drag to make his point: It may be your lawn, but it’s everybody’s water | BigGreenBoulder Boulder, CO : BigGreenBoulder on September 22nd, 2009 8:03 am

    [...] What our thirst for water does: A $3 billion, 400-mile water pipeline plan High temps, low water killing off area fish [...]