Lake Erie fish gather near low-oxygen zones as scientists study how climate change could reshape their habitat

• Image AI generatedLake Erie can look deceptively uniform from the surface.
• Beneath it, however, temperature, oxygen and nutrients divide the water into shifting layers, creating habitats that can change over surprisingly short distances.
• During the warmer months, parts of the lake’s deeper water can become depleted of dissolved oxygen, forming seasonal hypoxic zones that restrict where fish can remain.