"We're looking for something ecologically sound, economically feasible, and logistically attainable." Petersburg beaches in 1957, which killed off red tide algae cells, but the dead cells released toxins. For example, massive amounts of copper sulfate were dumped off St. Cynthia Heil, says the Red Tide Initiative is pursuing prevention, control, and mitigation strategies while trying to find a balance between effectiveness and possible side effects. Similar to NOAA, CDC confirms that while warming waters, ocean upwelling (such as El Niño and El Niña), and drought can contribute to increased phytoplankton that produce toxins, other causes include increases in nutrient levels such as phosphorus and nitrates due to fertilizer runoff from residences and agricultural lands, sewage discharges, and runoff from urban areas and industrial facilities. states report a hazardous algae bloom every year in a freshwater body, and all coastal states report harmful algae blooms in marine waters. The Center for Disease Control reports that more than 50% of U.S. Cynthia Heil, senior scientist and director of Mote's newly-formed Red Tide Initiative, they're working against the clock on more than 20 projects and technologies to find and test the most effective ways to mitigate adverse environmental and economic impacts. Mote has undertaken a six-year commitment with the state, in partnership with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission, to mitigate the effects of red tide. The Gulf of Mexico Loop Current, tides, storms, and upwelling carry the blooms to near-shore areas where they feed on human-contributed nutrients in the water, leading to explosive growth. Marine scientists and biologists at Mote Marine Laboratory and Aquarium in Sarasota, Florida, have studied red tide for decades and identify the broad, shallow area located 11 to 40 miles west of Florida's southwest coast as the neighborhood where these algae blooms grow. A single-cell dinoflagellate, it's one of some 100,000 algae species but also among the 300 species that form blooms, and the one that forms toxic blooms in southwest Florida. Red tide appears when there's a higher-than-normal concentration of microscopic photosynthetic organisms named Karenia brevis. Records show severe red tide blooms off the Gulf Coast in the mid-1900s. Massive areas offshore were total dead zones."įlorida red tides, or explosive blooms of naturally occurring colonies of phytoplankton, have been documented in the southern Gulf of Mexico for centuries. It got worse and worse." When the bloom finally cleared near-shore, there were offshore dead zones lasting into spring 2019. "Where we used to get a break in late fall, early winter, we didn't. Kyle Potts, owner of TowBoatUS Charlotte Harbor in southwest Florida, remembers several years of above-average red tide in 20, but nothing compared to June 2018. Have any changes put forth by individuals, governments, communities, and institutions made a difference? Or did we just get lucky? Red Menaceįlorida's 2018 outbreak covered the Gulf and Atlantic coasts in red-brown muck and thick mats of green toxic sludge, keeping recreational boats tied to shore, commercial fishermen docked, dead fish washing up on Sanibel's pristine beaches, and tissue-damaging breve toxins choking the air from Sarasota to St. At the close of the 2020 May-to-October wet season, Florida hadn't seen a return of algal blooms comparable in size and duration to those of 2018's disaster.Īt the start of this year, red tide remained present in low concentrations along the Florida Gulf Coast, with higher concentrations near Sanibel Island and the mouth of the Caloosahatchee River - but no extreme fish kills or multicoast environmental crises comparable to those of 2018. Though red tide has become a year-to-year issue that profoundly affects many Florida boaters and waterfront property owners, 2020 passed without a major toxic algae bloom.
0 kommentar(er)
