Question 45
There is mass mortality of fishes in a pond. What may be the reasons?
The mass mortality of fishes in a pond is a result of eutrophication. Eutrophication is a process by which plant growth increases in a water body like ponds or lakes. The excessive richness of nutrients in a lake or other body of water, frequently due to run-off from the land, causes a dense growth of plant life.The increased growth and overcrowding of plants is due to either natural fertilising agents that are washed off from the soil or the runoff of chemical fertilisers applied to agricultural lands. As the overcrowd plants die off, the dead and decaying vegetation deplete the pond’s oxygen supply. This, in turn, leads to the mass scale death of fish in the pond.