In some Canadian lakes, the water has been turning into a creepy jelly-like consistency, baffling swimmers and locals alike.

The find prompted researchers at Cambridge University to investigate the cause, and in a recently released study, scientists concluded the nasty occurrence is our fault.

Specifically, it's acid rain that's choking off calciumand causing some organisms to struggle to survive,the report said. Among those plankton is Daphnia, which relies on high levels of calcium in the water to thrive, Phys.org reported.

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This has altered the composition of the water, City Lab writes, and a slimy competitor to Daphnia has emerged. It's known as Holopedium, and it requires much less calcium to survive and is coated with a protective gel to keep away predators.

With this change in power occurring at the microscopic level more and more in Ontario's lakes since the 1980s, the report adds, swimmers are noticing their clean water is beginning to resemble jelly. What's more, about 20 percent of Canada's drinking water comes from the affected lakes, Gizmodo says.

Reversing this problem can't be achieved overnight, the study's authors say. Decades of industrialization spewed acid into the atmosphere over the Northern Hemisphere, and it may have been reducing calcium levels in the soil and allowing the Holopedium to thrive since 1850, the study found.

"It may take thousands of years to return to historic lake water calcium concentrations solely from natural weathering of surrounding watersheds," said Dr. Andrew Tanentzap, co-author of the study who works at Cambridge's Department of Plant Sciences."In the meanwhile, while we've stopped acid rain and improved the pH of many of these lakes, we cannot claim complete recovery from acidification. Instead, we may have pushed these lakes into an entirely new ecological state."

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Abraham Lake and Elliot Peak - Kootenay Plains - Alberta, Canada. (Credit: Darwin Wiggett)