Florida Red Tide Report, Red Tide News and Red Tide Info
The scientists said it would happen. I sure can understand why no one wanted to believe it. It seemed to easy to say predictions of a massive and intense red tide bloom were inaccurate when the season started with only sporadic out breaks of red tide. And then – BAM! Tons of very intense red tide blooms. With shellfish harvest closures from Cutler county to the Canadian Border.
We’re rooting for guys up there in Maine!
Categories: Red Tide Maine.
Did you know that Main’s Red tide is a completely different animal than the K. Brevis that makes up Florida Red Tide?
It’s called Alexandrium Tamarence. It behaves differently, but the effects are just as destructive.
Categories: Education, Red Tide Maine.
We told you last month that a very grim summer was predicted for the folks up in Maine. Looks like it has started early. Here’s an excerpt from a press release from the people at the Woods Hole:
Yesterday, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution senior scientist Donald Anderson told the Cape Cod Times that some small amounts of red tide toxins, below the level where it affects human or animal health, have begun showing up in shellfish along the North Shore and in one salt pond on the Cape.
Anderson said it is not clear yet whether March’s heavy rains, which wash nutrients off the land, will help feed a major red tide bloom if one develops. Northeast winds from storms also can aid a red tide outbreak by concentrating the algae along the shore, but Anderson said it was still unknown whether that was happening. Research cruises to gauge the size, location and spread of red tide blooms have not been scheduled to start until May 1.
They say they’ll have a little more information after they gather and analyze samples form the area waters off the coast of Maine and further offshore.
Categories: Environmental News, News, Red Tide Maine.
NOAA has been using some new technologies to predict future red tides. Off the coast of Maine, it appears that they will have the worst red tide ever this summer. New Hampshire is included in this gloomy forecast.
The projection is based on a sea-floor survey of the seed-like cysts of Alexandrium fundyense, (which is different than the K. Brevis red tide we get here in Fl, but just as devastating), an organism that causes the harmful algal blooms that are referred to as red tides. Cysts deposited in the fall hatch the following spring, and last fall the abundance of cysts in the sediment was 60 percent higher than observed prior to the historic bloom of 2005, indicating that a large bloom is likely in the spring of 2010.
The Scientists are so alarmed that they held a teleconference for the media in addition to their normal outlook report. Sadly the local oyster farmers seem to be in denial and even seem to be trying to blame the scientists. Saying things like “It’s so unlikely, We certainly don’t lose any sleep about it or worry much about it.” and that the last red tide closure that Duxbury oyster farmers faced was in 2005, when the state’s shellfish industry grappled with the worst red tide bloom in recent memory. Well guys, this one is supposed to be even worse so get worried. Not that there is anything to do about it. Continued…
Categories: Environmental News, News, Red Tide Maine, Rumors, inept government.
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