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More than 290,000 Lake Hartwell blueback herring were killed Sept. 29 when they were sucked into the Hartwell Dam turbines and discharged into the upper end of Lake Russell, according to the S.C. Department of Natural Resources.
The average size of the fish killed in the Lake Hartwell turbines was 6 inches. Blueback herring is an important food fish for many of Lake Hartwell^s predators including striped bass, hybrid striped bass (Palmetto bass) and largemouth bass. Lake Hartwell Dam is operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Savannah District. Lake Hartwell is a 56,000-acre Corps of Engineer^s impoundment on Savannah River near Anderson.
"Blueback herring often congregate in the dam region of Lake Hartwell during the late summer to early fall months," said Wade Bales, district fishery biologist for the S.C. Department of Natural Resources (DNR). "This occurs when the fish^s preferred habitat of cool, well-oxygenated water is reduced to a small area in front of the turbine intakes. A previous and similar kill in the early 1990s led the Corps of Engineers and DNR to agree to monitoring procedures designed to prevent or lessen events such as this one."
The procedures to prevent blueback herring kills require the Corps to monitor the habitat in front of the dam to detect when conditions become favorable for the herring to congregate, according to Bales. Once these conditions are met, the Corps becomes responsible for monitoring the numbers of fish and water quality to determine the potential for them to be sucked or entrained into the turbines. When large numbers of herring are in front of the dam, the Corps is required to watch the water below the dam. If dead fish are seen below the dam, specific procedures require the turbines to be shut down.
"Obviously the Corps^ monitoring procedures failed to prevent more than 290,000 fish from being killed on September 29," said Val Nash, DNR chief of freshwater fisheries. "They have a procedure that is supposed to stop these unacceptable events from happening, but for some reason the Corps^ implementation was ineffective."
Following the kill of Sept. 29, the Corps did begin to monitor the conditions more closely. However, the very next day the Corps was required to activate shutdown procedures due to the high numbers of fish being entrained. More than 60,000 additional blueback herring were killed before the turbines could be stopped, according to Nash.
"It is frustrating to know that a total estimated 17 tons of blueback herring were killed in this manner, rather than being available to support the thousands of pounds of recreationally important species such as largemouth bass, striped bass and Palmetto bass," Nash said.
The fish kills at Hartwell Dam are different than those immediately downstream at the Russell Dam, which is also operated by the Corps of Engineers, Savannah District. "Environmental testing of the pumpback project at Lake Russell resulted in more than 7.9 million fish being killed from 1992-1996," said Gerrit Jobsis, an environmental coordinator for DNR. "In the case of Russell Dam where many different species of fish were killed, most died when the reversible turbines were operating in the pump mode."
The South Carolina DNR continues to investigate the fish kill and could not say how it may be resolved. "Our goal is to develop effective protocols and see that they are implemented to prevent this type of event from happening again," Jobsis said.
Uploaded: 10/9/1999
Uploaded: 10/9/1999