The City of Burnaby is reminding people not to dump anything down storm drains after someone reported a milky substance in Eagle Creek on Sunday, Oct. 2.
Christine Ensing from the city's environmental services department was on the scene by Sunday around 1:15 p.m., but it was too late to trace the source.
"It had already flowed through. At that point you can't track where it came from," she said. "It would have probably been a cleaning agent or somebody washing paint brushes and dumping it down the drain."
Ensing said the water looked milky but she did not find any dead fish. Eagle Creek has its headwaters on Burnaby Mountain and flows into Burnaby Lake. The site of the milky substance was east of Phillips Avenue.
Under the Fisheries Act, it is illegal to dump any harmful substance into areas with fish or waterways leading to their habitat.
"All street drains drain to a creek, to fish habitat," Ensing said. "Nothing should be dumped down a drain, only rainwater should go down a drain. ... Just think of the fish."
Nick Kvenich, a longtime volunteer with the Eagle Creek Streamkeepers, guessed the substance was latex paint.
"There's a good possibility that someone's been painting, and they've dumped (something) in the creek," he said. "It makes the fish uncomfortable, but it's not like the oil stuff that will stick to their gills. ... Still it's uncomfortable."
