A spokesperson for the Department of Industry and Investment, which is in charge of the analysis, told the Advocate last week that further testing is required on the specimen and it is unknown when the results will be available.

Tests were carried out in early February after Smiths Lake residents reported mullet, flathead and whiting were washing up on the shoreline severely underweight since Christmas.

The Cheers and Bramble family, who’ve fished in the lake for 140 years, have documentary evidence of the lake’s condition leading back to 1932 and say they’ve never seen an incident as severe.

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