San Carlos Lake in Arizona has been closed indefinitely after officials said a major fish kill wiped out approximately 100% of the fish population in the lake. The San Carlos Recreation and Wildlife Department announced the shutdown on Friday, June 5, and said the lake would remain closed until further notice.

The closure lands hardest for anglers and other visitors who use San Carlos Lake as a recreation spot. Officials have now banned fishing, harvesting or possessing fish from the lake, along with all recreational fishing-related activities, after warning that decomposing fish could create health hazards for anyone entering the area or trying to fish.

San Carlos Lake sits on the San Carlos Apache Tribal Lands about 160 miles east of Phoenix and has more than 150 miles of shoreline, making it one of Arizona’s largest lakes. Its size had not protected it from worsening drought conditions. On April 3, the department said the lake had fallen to just 1.93% capacity, was continuing to decline rapidly and was losing about 0.5% every 10 days.

At the time, officials also warned that boat launches could soon become unusable and said a fish kill could happen before the end of the month. Those warnings proved accurate. Officials now say drought conditions and water releases from the dam led to the die-off, turning a popular fishing destination into a closed zone with no reopening date.

What happens next is still unclear. Officials said they will keep monitoring conditions, but they have not given a timetable for reopening or detailed any recovery work for the fishery. For now, the lake remains shut, and the public is being kept out until further notice.