Low Oxygen Levels In Lake.

[Sloan]

I live in West Texas and fish for largemouth bass. The lakes here are all about dry. Most lakes are below 30%.

I talked with with a guy checking jug lines the other day. He told me that most of the fish caught on the deepest hooks were dead.

Makes me think that the oxygen levels might be low in the deeper areas of the lake.

I have also noticed that I have continued to catch bass shallow even though it has been over 100 degrees for something like 60 days.

Does this sound like this lake might be getting ready to go through a low oxygen kill?

Does a low oxygen kill start from the bottom up?

Thank you.

[MLlanes]

i would assume it would be the other way around. The deeper water is colder and colder water holds more oxygen. Odd that the lower fish were dead. Maybe they were on the hook too long?

[ripinthem]

Stress levels are high, esp for a struggling/hooked/bleeding fish, right now. Some fish will be shallow, right now, but most are going to be deep, unless they are actively feeding(even that is rare in the daytime).

[Randall]

Don't know about a kill there but it does happen in some lakes in the South. I would suspect the fish died of a combination of stress from trying to get away and low oxygen levels in the deeper water. Fish might have been fine with the low levels of oxygen if they hadn't been hooked.

Kills usually happen when fish become "trapped" between layers of water. They stay in the cooler water below and a wide band of oxygen depleted waterforms above them as the deep water starts to run out of oxygen as well.Since they don't swim up through the oxygen depleted layer in the middle they die.

The shallow fish are usually fine and the deep "trapped" fish die.

I live on a small mostly shallow lake that has a very shallow thermocline right now. Most of the fish are in less than 6 feet of water since the deep water has very little if any oxygen. You see people all the time fishing deep (10-15 feet)out in the lake around the creek channnels since it's hot and they think the fish have to be there. They are not catching any fish since they are fishing below all the fish while you can fish shallow and catch them all day long in 90+ degree water.