Indianapolis-Environmental and natural resources investigators who have been looking into a fish kill in Randolph County that has exceeded 100,000 for nearly two months still aren’t explaining what happened or who is responsible. “We really can’t say much about it until the investigation is complete,” Barry Sneed, Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM) spokesman, told Green Markets. “Sometimes it’s from natural occurrences; other times it’s from some other source.” In a brief email followup, Sneed explained that the first report of dead fish in the Mississinewa River came into the IDEM spill line on Sunday, June 20. “The broad area that we are looking at is in Bear Creek in Randolph County to the Mississinewa to the complainant’s location roughly 11 miles downstream, almost to Delaware County. Because of heavy rains at the time of the call, it is difficult to condense the area of investigation,” the statement explained. “The source or sources and cause or causes of the fish kill are being investigated, and whether any laws were broken.” Phil Bloom, spokesman for the Indiana Department of Natural Resources, confirmed that the number of dead fish was 106,605, while declining to talk about a cause or reports that a 21-mile stretch of Mississinewa River had been affected. But members of Indiana Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFO) Watch didn’t hesitate to name as a prime suspect a large animal feeding operation in Randolph County, where the organization claims 4,000 swine generate over 200,000 cubic feet of manure annually. Others are saying that liquid nitrogen fertilizer applied by corn farmers could have been washed into the river by an unexpected heavy rainfall.
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