Fish kill on river with history of "environmental genocide"

PONCA CITY, Okla. (KOKH) — As far as fish kills go, this one was not that bad; there simply are not enough fish left to kill according to locals who live along the Salt Fork River just south of Ponca City.

“It is sad to think that one day there won’t be any and that affects other ecosystems as well,” said Elizabeth Glaser who, along with her husband Tim, led us on a tour up the Salt Fork River. Over the years the Glasers have come to recognize the first signs of a major fish kill; this one was no different. “The water changed colors to a tea color and it smells foul.”

The river is down several feet from where it was at the height of the fish kill. The banks are now littered with bones of fish that have been scavenged. There is also the carcass of a dead dear that died in the water.

“It just breaks your heart to see the dead fish floating by and the wildlife,” Glaser said.

The fish kills started several years ago. Most of the time, the Glasers told FOX 25, it is the big bottom feeder fish that are the victims. Recently smaller fish and even minnows are dying in what they call toxic water.

“It is time for it to stop,” Glaser told FOX 25, “No matter what we have to do to stop it.”

Many times fish kills happen from low oxygen levels in stagnated water. In the case of the Salt Fork River, the fish die after rains, when the water level is high. “When it rains when the creeks and washes run into the river is when it happens,” Glaser said.

Just upstream from the Glaser’s home, the Salt Fork runs through the land of the Ponca Tribe. Along the banks of the campground are signs warning visitors for the tribe’s annual Powwow to avoid the water.

“If it was a normal gathering at this time we would see our banks lined with fishers and possibly a lot of our children would be swimming,” said Casey Camp-Horinek, a councilwoman for the Ponca Tribe.

Camp-Horinek said water has been a growing concern for the tribe. Some members have had to have water brought in when their wells became undrinkable. “We all know that water is life,” Camp-Horinek told FOX 25.

Some of the locals blame oil and gas production, or the salty waste water it produces for the environmental problems. While there has been no official cause determined by state officials investigating, Camp-Horinek said the tribe was not waiting to make changes.

In February the Ponca Tribe passed a resolution issuing a moratorium on future oil and gas activity on tribal land. “We have to as citizens take control,” Camp-Horinek said of the resolution and the tribe’s commitment to making sure their natural resources stay clean. She believes the years of mass fish kills amount to “environmental genocide.”

“It is going to take all of us humans,” Camp-Horinek said, Because we’re talking for those without voices for the deer, for the cattle, for those that fly, we’re seeing buzzards all over here now because of the fish kill they are all over the land and all over the water but they too have a right to live and those that swim in this water have a right to live”

In 2015 the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality launched the Oklahoma Kill Response Management Team in response to the repeated fish kills. The group is made up of experts from several state agencies including the DEQ, the Department of Wildlife, the Oklahoma Water Resources Board and the Oklahoma Corporation Commission.

The DEQ told FOX 25 they are still monitoring the water and the dead fish. So far there has been no definitive solution as to what is causing the fish kills, but the agency remains committed to working to end them.