By Sammie Snoop, Staff Reporter       

    Slippery Creek-Two weeks ago, José Rodriguez was fishing near his home along Slippery Creek when he found four dead fish. 

    Having fished in the creek for most of his thirty-four years, he was used to providing his family with a fish dinner three times a week.

    Overhearing Rodriguez complain of his bad luck to a waitress while lunching at Silver Cliff Diner was Megan Lee Jones, a water resource manager for Silver County .  After a short conversation together, Jones returned to work, beginning her research to find the cause.

    In the early part of the century, the MH Mining Company of Silver Cliff became the largest extractor of silver in the region.  The company greatly boosted the economy of much of Silver County .

    Little did the mine's founder, Joshua Millhouse, know that silver mining releases other metals, some toxic, which can be spread distances away from the mine by means of water.

    Besides killing fish and other wildlife, the water quality often falls below drinking standards.  Moreover, agriculture is unlikely to be sustained.

    The usual contaminating elements left over from silver mining are lead, cadmium, zinc, copper, iron, arsenic, and manganese.  A high exposure to lead, for instance, can weaken intelligence, cause hyperactivity, and even induce memory loss.

    Cyanide also usually appears in sediment.  A brief exposure to a small amount can lead to rapid, deep breathing; shortness of breath; convulsions; and loss of consciousness.  Higher exposures over a short period of time can harm the central nervous system, often resulting in coma or death.

    Jones and members of her team took water samples from the creek and actually discovered a new life form:  a microbe that lives in acid.

   "You mean that I’ve been drinking acid all this time?" asked Rodriguez, when told of the findings.  "I even ate two of those fish I found."

    The uproar spurred the Colorado division of the Environmental Protection Agency to commit to a thorough, more technical investigation of the water quality, likely to begin next month. 

    With Slippery Creek being a lower-income community compared to the remainder of Silver County , health risks pose a potentially greater threat.  The community doesn't have the money to initiate a stiffer clean-up program for the creek.  And because of the poverty in the area, many residents rely on the free food source that the fish in the creek have always provided.

    Jones is expecting that the EPA will realize the dire need to clean up the water in the area.  "I just hope that no one's health is in jeopardy.  With Slippery Creek running into Trout Lake , many more people could become affected, if the situation is serious enough."

    Rachel LeBaron, president of the Trout Lake Homeowners Association, has posted signs around the lake, advising visitors to not go swimming until the EPA has announced its findings.