BATON ROUGE - Scores of dead fish turned up at City Park Lake Friday, and officials are working on ways to prevent this from happening again.

It was a nauseating scene for many people nearby. Several BREC employees quickly took action, searching the lake and scooping up dozens of dead fish into nets.

"Right now we're targeting the fish. We're trying to get those out of the way so they don't stink. This is still a nice recreational place for people to come and visit,"  BREC official Amanda Takacs said.

It appears that depleted oxygen levels often lead to fish kills, and this week's stormy weather altered the lake's conditions.

"With the tropical storm and the hurricane, the conditions in the lake were not suitable for dissolved oxygen, which the fish need to survive. So we did end up with a small fish kill. We've got the crews out here just cleaning that up,"  Takacs said.

Fixing this problem long term will mean dredging. That plan is already in the works.

"The lakes ultimately need to be cleaned up with the dredging process, and that process is underway. This event is just a very minor thing in the grand scheme of the history of the lakes," she said.

BREC says it took crews at least an hour to clear the dead fish.