Wondering if Something Happened to My Local Pond

[Person243]

It seems like the salamander larvae in my pond disappeared in a short time and a lot of them died. In June there were about 100 visible at once, but a few weeks later there were a lot of dead ones and the few left mostly didn't look in good health. In another nearby pond, I saw at least ten adults and a few larvae swimming around. I was wondering if there could've been some sort of disease outbreak in the pond, or if anyone knows anything about what might have happened.

 

[Otterwoman]

Maybe you could take a water sample to a pet store where they do free testing and see if the water is bad?

 

[MnGuy]

How big and deep is your pond, and is it exposed to full sun for long hours? Maybe it overheated and a lack of oxygen killed them. Does it have other animal life that survived just fine? Do you or anyone near you use chemicals in their lawn that could have leached in?

Is the other pond bigger, deeper and in more shade?

 

[Person243]

How big and deep is your pond, and is it exposed to full sun for long hours? Maybe it overheated and a lack of oxygen killed them. Does it have other animal life that survived just fine? Do you or anyone near you use chemicals in their lawn that could have leached in?

Is the other pond bigger, deeper and in more shade?

The pond is about 250 ft long, 70-80 ft wide and shallow in a lot of areas, it's been getting more sun from shade trees dying. There were lots of garter snakes around and diving beetles, backswimmers and insects like that. No chemicals or lawns. Some sort of algae started growing in the water about the time the salamander population dropped. The other pond is smaller but probably deeper.

 

[taapua]

Perhaps a toxic algae bloom?

 

[MnGuy]

Yeah, I was going to say that if you saw a sudden algae bloom it could have been the result of bad water quality, which would be hard on the salamanders.

 

[Person243]

If it might help, here are some low-quality pictures of what's been growing