Dead fish litter an Orange, Texas, parking lot. Hurricane Ike's storm surge is blamed for massive fish kills in Texas.
Tommy Mann Jr. / The Orange Leader

By Chester Moore, Jr.
The Orange Leader

ORANGE, Texas - Thousands of dead redfish line the streets in Orange’s Cove area.

Along with menhaden, croaker, speckled trout, sheepshead, largemouth bass, buffalo and other species, they represent a massive fish kill brought on by Hurricane Ike.

The story is the same in Bridge City, Port Arthur and Sabine Pass where fish are stuck in fences, rotting on rooftops and floating along waterways.

"This is a classic version of a storm-related fish kill," said Shane Bonnot, Texas Parks & Wildlife biologist.

Bonnot said when Gulf water, saltier than the area’s brackish marshes, washes in and stands for a few days it kills vegetation and in turn, chokes out oxygen in the water.

The process wipes out marsh dwellers and then drains and kills fish in surrounding waters. Ike's storm surge pushed seawater across the entire Sabine Lake ecosystem well into the marshes of the Sabine and Neches Rivers. As waters receded, dead fish were left behind.

Fish pushed inland found themselves swimming in neighborhoods and fences acted liked like gill nets, capturing those attempting to swim through them.

Texas Parks & Wildlife restocked redfish, speckled trout and bass after Hurricane Rita dealt a similar blow to the area’s fish population.

"Areas with fish kills, whether they are caused by storms, freezes or other factors, get priority status for stockings," Bonnot said.

Nature also has a contingency plan.While redfish were hard hit, Ike most likely planted seeds for the future.

Capt. Kirk Stansel, Hackberry Rod and Gun Club, said since Hurricane Rita hit, the redfish fishery on Lake Calcasieu is better than ever.

“That Hurricane helped out fishing a lot over the long haul,” Stansel said. “All of these little freshwater ponds in the marshes and prairie have redfish and the only way they could’ve gotten there is the storm put them there. We simply have a huge number of reds in the system, and the storm helped."

A study of Texas’ Lower Laguna Madre showed that after a storm in 1967 cut channels into the estuaries, redfish numbers increased significantly. Eggs spawned in the nearshore Gulf during the fall breeding period were brought into the marshes via storm surge.

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Chester Moore Jr. writes for The Orange Leader in Orange, Texas.