Lake Erie Dead Fish Wash Up On Shore; Mystery Death Points To Lack Of Oxygen

Thousands of dead fish, and dead seagulls, were found Saturday on the shores of Lake Erie over Labor Day weekend, raising suspicious over what could have caused the massive amounts of animal deaths. New reports are leaning toward a possible suffocation as the cause of death. 

Samples of the dead animals have been sent to labs for examination, according to the Huffington Post, and the Ontario Ministries of Environment in Canada were said to have been analyzing whether a potential spill occurred that killed the fish. 

The Niagra River empties Lake Erie into Lake Ontario in Canada. Erie is the eleventh largest lake in the world by surface area and the fourth largest of the Great Lakes for the same reason. The dead fish were found on the Canadian side of the lake.

Numerous reports offered the same possibility for the fish deaths. An inversion process, a natural occurrence that happens when cold water, which has low oxygen levels, goes to the lake's surface, could have suffocated the fish. When the surface water temperature drops dramatically and is replaced with low levels of oxygen, the fish living in the waters are unable to breath and will ultimately die from lack of oxygen.

On Sept. 5, the International Business Times reported that a spokeswoman for Ontario's Ministry of Environment confirmed to a radio station that investigators have so far not found any evidence of a chemical, toxic spill or pollution in relation to the thousands of fish found dead.

Investigators are more and more leaning toward inversion as an answer to the dead fish found on Lake Erie's shores. However, not many are discussing the deaths of numerous seagulls also found on the shores. 

The sight and smell of the dead animals also took a toll on residents and those visiting the shores to celebrate Labor Day weekend.

"At this time of the year it is common to get lake turnover or lake inversion and you usually do get a few fish killed ... but this smell smelled like a sewer ... and on top of the water there was a brown kind of milky film that was at the water's edge," a Ontario resident  told the Toronto Star.

It has yet to be announced how much the cleanup will cost.