STONEFISH SEARCH DRAIN SAILING

THE plug is yet to be pulled on the search for the elusive stonefish at Evandale Lake with the Gold Coast City Council taking extreme action yesterday.

The equivalent of more than 14 Olympic-size swimming pools is being drained from the Bundall swimming hole to try and find the highly venomous creature.

It will take about two weeks to empty the lake which has been closed since the fish was seen by a member of the public last month.

Gold Coast waterways manager Darren Ford said the lake would be drained to about three to four metres deep.

“Once it gets down to that low, we will look at netting the lake and removing the bulk fish species that are in there,” he said.

“It’s not about draining the lake as quick as we can.

“We certainly don’t want to have a fish kill of any sort so we are working with Sea World to do that netting.”

While the lake is empty the council will complete about $120,000 in repairs, including removal of algae build-up, adding more sand to the foreshore and re-rocking walls to prevent erosion.

It is expected the lake will remain closed until mid-September.