“Look,” Chris Ozyck called out. “There’s another whirling disease fish.”
Ozyck, associate director of Urban Resources Initiative (URI), was joining volunteers from his organization and Friends of Quinnipiac River Park Thursday afternoon putting new life in the soil in the form of lilies and other perennials.
Nearby at water’s edge of the riverine park, he and other planters noticed at least half a dozen menhaden — or bait fish also known as “bunker” — spinning around in their dance of death.
Click on the video above to follow one of the fish as it made its way downriver, with the opportunistic sea gulls following and closing in.
That dance has been happening a lot lately on the east side of town. Click here for a previous Independent story on what scientists call the naturally occurring “whirling disease” that affects the Atlantic menhaden and is apparently an okay part of the ecosystem.
And here for official notice from the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection attempting to explain the thousands of dead menhaden that washed up on the Connecticut shore over the Memorial Day weekend, including along Quinnipiac River marshland.
Allan Appel Photo
The fish noticed Thursday were individuals, not schools, or even small group. They appeared to be out of control, not swimming, as they spun, carried by the tide downriver toward the harbor.
I'm glad this was identified as a one-off diseased pool of fish--it also happened in other rivers in CT. Folks fish and eat wonderful tasting fish from the Quinnipiac often and have for years and seemingly, there is not only no harm in that but likely the fresh fish helps constitute a healthier diet for the locals.