Nearly 11,000 fish representing 25 species were found dead along more than four miles of Basin Run in Cecil County. Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) preliminary findings point to an overflow from a manure lagoon at Kilby Farms, according to The Baltimore Banner. The finding is preliminary; the agency’s investigation and the related court proceedings are separate from a final determination of legal responsibility.
Statewide records offer a useful frame for the scale of the event, but not a Basin Run trend. MDE’s 2025 fish-kill report says the agency received 89 reports that year: 80 were classified as fish kills, and 59 warranted an on-site investigation. The report also said statewide fish-kill events had been well below average over the preceding decade. Those statewide figures do not explain this incident or establish whether fish kills are becoming more frequent in Basin Run.
The same report attributed five 2025 events to pollution or other direct human causes, involving approximately 335 fish, and said an average of eight pollution-caused fish kills occur annually. That is a statewide summary for a different year, not a direct comparison of causes or impacts in this 2026 event.
A local case still before the court
The Banner reported that MDE had previously sued Kilby Farms and Hartland Holdings, alleging they failed to comply with an August 2025 settlement concerning releases into Basin Run. The court later issued a preliminary injunction barring the facility from discharging pollution into the stream. Following the latest fish kill, MDE asked a judge to hold the farm in civil contempt of that order, the newspaper reported. A hearing on the motion is scheduled for Oct. 13 in Cecil County; the motion is an allegation, not a contempt finding.
The latest die-off follows an earlier fish kill associated with the farm. The Banner reported that the earlier incident, just over a year before this one, killed hundreds of fish in the same stream; accounts of the earlier toll differed. The two events are evidence of separate reported incidents at the same waterway, but do not by themselves establish their precise causes or a broader trend.
Basin Run supports a wild trout population, and a September 2025 Maryland Department of Natural Resources fisheries report identifies the stream as Use III, with portions also designated Tier II. The report documents the stream’s fisheries status; it does not measure the effects of this fish kill. The Oct. 13 hearing will address MDE’s contempt motion, while the preliminary findings about the overflow remain distinct from what the court may decide.
