Oxygen@Oxygen_Token
Virtually every fish in one of Arizona’s largest lakes has died after the reservoir fell to less than 1% of its capacity.
This spring, the mountain snow that feeds the reservoir reached just 2% of its normal level. With almost no inflow, the lake shrank dramatically, the water overheated, oxygen levels collapsed, and nearly 100% of the fish suffocated.
But drought wasn’t the only reason.
Even as the reservoir was collapsing, water continued flowing downstream to supply farms under agreements written decades ago, when a snowpack collapse this severe was considered unthinkable.
The ecosystem kept losing water while the climate that sustained it had already changed.
The rules were built for a world that no longer exists.
Climate change isn’t only testing ecosystems. It’s testing the systems we built to manage them.
Before and after: San Carlos Reservoir, Arizona (2023 vs. 2026).
[Source: NASA Earth Observatory, June 2026.]