A pair of First Nations in B.C.’s Fraser Valley say a recent toxic spill may have killed up to 1,000 juvenile salmon in a local waterway.
The Cheam and Sqwá First Nations say they discovered the fish kill in the Hope Slough in Chilliwack on Monday while members were conducting routine water sampling.
“When we arrived the water was black, we couldn’t even see through a couple inches of the water, and all salmonid were dead. So the shores were lined with dead coho, trout, sculpin and the stickleback were at the surface gasping for air,” said Roxanna Kooistra, project manager on the Cheam First Nation’s Hope Slough Restoration Project.
“It’s something we only see when the water quality drops and the oxygen drops so low that all the other fish have suffocated.”
Members initially believed the spill might have been a petroleum product and called in an environmental restoration company to deploy booms.
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But they …