![]() Thousands of dead fish killed by red tide in Boca Ciega Bay in Madeira Beach, Florida. And while these events are not necessarily becoming more common, as you might expect, climate change is making them much harder to forecast - and Florida’s booming population is making them far more visible. ![]() Red tides in Florida result from a complicated set of variables, from ocean currents to weather patterns, researchers have learned. The state’s current governor, Ron DeSantis, has rebuffed calls from environmental groups to declare a state of emergency for this year’s red tide. Rick Scott declared a state of emergency, as Vox’s Brian Resnick previously reported. The last major red tide was just three years ago, when then-Gov. Now scientists are racing to determine what makes a year particularly bad for red tides - and whether they’re becoming more common. The algae have not only killed untold thousands of fish and more than a dozen manatees but also sickened some beachgoers, who can experience respiratory issues when the toxins become airborne. ![]() While algal blooms are a natural phenomenon in southwest Florida - and across much of the world - they’re typically not this severe. They were killed by an overgrowth of toxic algae, known as red tide, that came inland earlier this summer. In the past three weeks, more than 1,700 tons of dead fish and other marine organisms and debris have washed ashore along beaches near Tampa Bay. You can also sign our letter to the SF Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board compelling the agency to invest in nutrient pollution research and to reduce nutrient discharges into the Bay.The scenes from western Florida are hard to stomach: fish carcasses dotting beaches for miles, a backhoe lifting a 400-pound goliath grouper out of the water, hundreds of sharks swimming through neighborhoods, and hordes of maggots wriggling along the shore. We're encouraging our supporters to send a message to San Francisco officials to urge the city to invest in water recycling technology to help prevent algae blooms and fish kills in the future and to reduce the city’s over-reliance on the Tuolumne River, which was once a major spawning ground for Chinook Salmon and Steelhead that traverse the Bay. Please report suspicious looking or smelling water to our Pollution Hotline. akashiwo – Baykeeper advises caution when entering any water that is discolored, especially during late-spring and summer. Also, future blooms may be caused by completely different organisms, some of which are much more toxic that H. While the organism that formed this bloom, Heterosigma akashiwo, is not generally considered an acute risk to people we advise caution when considering recreating in the Bay or consuming fish, and particularly shellfish, caught in areas where any algal bloom is present. Now that the active bloom appears to have ended, and cooler shorter days are likely to prevent further blooms this year, our scientists will continue to collaborate with relevant agencies and researchers to determine the specific trigger for this year’s bloom and to increase our understanding of how we can prevent new blooms and tragic fish kills in the future. Reports of dead fish, and particularly newly killed fish, tapered off significantly by early September. Starting in late August, we received increasingly frequent reports of unprecedented numbers of dead fish-including large sturgeon, sharks, rays, and striped bass, as well as masses of smaller fish-in the water and on shorelines. However, because the conditions that fueled the bloom-excessive nutrients in the water, sunlight, and warm, slow moving water-are common throughout the Bay, Baykeeper remains concerned that harmful algal blooms may emerge again next summer and beyond. It is unlikely these conditions will re-emerge this year. Low dissolved oxygen conditions and fish kills that followed this summer’s algal bloom, commonly called “red tide,” have come to an end. SF Baykeeper continues to advise caution against contacting murky, discolored waters and encourages reports of these conditions to its Pollution Hotline. The Bay’s unprecedented “red tide” algal bloom has almost completely gone away.
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