Red tide in Florida

[brocksw]

Anyone in Florida that can provide some good info on this issue? Groups trying to fix the parts that can be fixed? Or educate me on the political BS that's going on around it?

To my understanding there is some element of naturally occurring red tide, but it's being exacerbated in frequency and severity by spills and leaks of sewage, toxicwaste water from places like Piney Point, and a few other factors.

Thanks

 

[hank4elk]

I know nothing of the Atlantic.
But naturally occurring and increases with toxins involved are 2 different things. Seen it my whole life.
There was a time the whole Socal coast would just stink in the 60's.
Watched it go from once in a great while on the central ca coast, go to, it happens every storm & summer.
A couple times getting sick stopped my love of good storm surf and disregard for the e-coli notices during perfect swells.

 

[pwrwgn57]

Coworker just came back from family vacation in Clearwater. Smelled so bad they had to change hotels after the first day.

 

[brocksw]

Coworker just came back from family vacation in Clearwater. Smelled so bad they had to change hotels after the first day.

A few hundred tons of dead fish will do that...

 

[NoWiser]

I was down in Ft Myers Beach a couple years ago when it peaked there. You could have walked a mile down the beach with your feet only touching dead fish. It was unreal. Nonstop coughing from anyone who got near the ocean. You still can’t keep trout, redfish, or snook though I hear the populations are starting to come back.

From my research there are a lot of factors, but the big one is that water from Lake O is being diverted to the coast instead of flowing south through the Everglades. This water is super nutrient rich from yards, golf courses, and faulty septic systems and, while it may not necessarily cause red tides, it makes them exponentially worse.

This issue should be getting more publicity than it does. It’s a shame. In order to really fix it, the sugar industry south of Lake O would have to be taken on, and most Florida politicians get major donations from them. Sounds like they even own a ranch in Texas that they invite the politicians down to, to shoot big bucks.

 

[brocksw]

I was down in Ft Myers Beach a couple years ago when it peaked there. You could have walked a mile down the beach with your feet only touching dead fish. It was unreal. Nonstop coughing from anyone who got near the ocean. You still can’t keep trout, redfish, or snook though I hear the populations are starting to come back.

From my research there are a lot of factors, but the big one is that water from Lake O is being diverted to the coast instead of flowing south through the Everglades. This water is super nutrient rich from yards, golf courses, and faulty septic systems and, while it may not necessarily cause red tides, it makes them exponentially worse.

This issue should be getting more publicity than it does. It’s a shame. In order to really fix it, the sugar industry south of Lake O would have to be taken on, and most Florida politicians get major donations from them. Sounds like they even own a ranch in Texas that they invite the politicians down to, to shoot big bucks.

Ive heard some of that as well. I've also heard that another significant factor(s) is the sewage spills/leaks and the phosphate mine Piney Point, releasing periodically when the reservoir starts causing home damage. I believe Piney Point dumped 200 million gallons of toxic waste water into Tampa Bay this spring.

It looks to me like there are a number of factors that need to be corrected for this issue to start moving the other directions.

 

[Pucky Freak]

I will be in Clearwater for a 2-week family vacation in August. I had hoped to do a lot of inshore fishing, but at this point the prospect looks pretty grim.

 

[Jacack]

Ive heard some of that as well. I've also heard that another significant factor(s) is the sewage spills/leaks and the phosphate mine Piney Point, releasing periodically when the reservoir starts causing home damage. I believe Piney Point dumped 200 million gallons of toxic waste water into Tampa Bay this spring.

It looks to me like there are a number of factors that need to be corrected for this issue to start moving the other directions.

I live in naples and this is absolutely correct. Problem is it will never get changed . Too much money tied to the root of all the issues.

Take a look at captains for clean water if you want a more in depth look.

 

[Jacack]

Home - Captains For Clean Water

www.google.com

 

[Jacack]

As a side not the current red tide mess is isolated to Tampa and immediate surrounding areas. We in naples have no issues. I am a full time captain here and make my living on the water and seeing what happened up there is unreal.

 

[brocksw]

Home - Captains For Clean Water

www.google.com

Not sure if you can comment on this. But, I've heard captains for clean water's main goal or strategy is to divert the flow back south from Lake O. However, in doing so, this would displace millions of Floridians due to flooding and such damage that came with that. Are you able to comment on this?

 

[LuketheDog]

I know nothing of the Atlantic.
But naturally occurring and increases with toxins involved are 2 different things. Seen it my whole life.
There was a time the whole Socal coast would just stink in the 60's.
Watched it go from once in a great while on the central ca coast, go to, it happens every storm & summer.
A couple times getting sick stopped my love of good storm surf and disregard for the e-coli notices during perfect swells.

Yep, there were days when it was just too good not to go out...

 

[mottlet]

Not sure if you can comment on this. But, I've heard captains for clean water's main goal or strategy is to divert the flow back south from Lake O. However, in doing so, this would displace millions of Floridians due to flooding and such damage that came with that. Are you able to comment on this?

Curious where you heard that? I'd take it with more than a grain of salt...

The water has to get south. Crash course can be found here.

 

[Jacack]

Not sure if you can comment on this. But, I've heard captains for clean water's main goal or strategy is to divert the flow back south from Lake O. However, in doing so, this would displace millions of Floridians due to flooding and such damage that came with that. Are you able to comment on this?

Yeah they do want to send it south as it did naturaly one time or atleast enough that they don't need to discharge from. Lake o into Tampa Bay

. But obviously flooding out anyone is not part of the plan.

 

[Hammsolo]

I like to keep situations like this simple at first, and then look at systems. Algae only requires a few essentials to grow: water, sunlight, carbon, and nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus. Temperature (level of thermal energy) greatly effects speed of photosynthesis. Faster photosynthesis speeds up reproduction. So, what is going on in the system? Has a variable changed?

 

[longbow51]

Plagues ravage the land, red tide in Florida, algae in the Gallatin, and the moon in Montana has definitely turned to blood. Starting to sound a little Biblical.

 

[ragin-cajun]

Anyone in Florida that can provide some good info on this issue? Groups trying to fix the parts that can be fixed? Or educate me on the political BS that's going on around it?

To my understanding there is some element of naturally occurring red tide, but it's being exacerbated in frequency and severity by spills and leaks of sewage, toxicwaste water from places like Piney Point, and a few other factors.

Thanks

It’s natural but farm fertilizer runoff speeds up the blooms

 

[Sagebrush1]

I know nothing of the Atlantic.
But naturally occurring and increases with toxins involved are 2 different things. Seen it my whole life.
There was a time the whole Socal coast would just stink in the 60's.
Watched it go from once in a great while on the central ca coast, go to, it happens every storm & summer.
A couple times getting sick stopped my love of good storm surf and disregard for the e-coli notices during perfect swells.

Yah. Growing up as an avid free diver in San Diego, we kept a pretty good eye on this stuff. As a marine bio major I learned a little about it also.
Definitely a typical yearly occurrence, but severity and expansiveness varied greatly by the year.
It was normal for marine mammals (sea lions typically in my area) and fish to be affected by the toxins preset in the microorganisms that generated the “red tide”. Also normal to get some pretty gnarley sinus or ear infections if you spent to much time in that crap.
It was always worst during colder water years when we had a lot of NW wind and upwelling (more nutrients), so I’d imagine nutrient runoff would be a pretty big factor in severity also. This is super common in fresh water algal systems that experience farm runoff or things like that.
It was interesting because some years it was red, or greenish, or yellow, or brown, and sometimes foamy or smelly, or scummy. I always assumed that different species generated the differences in color or appearance. Many of the organisms responsible are also bioluminescent so at night the waves would glow, and you could see everything cruising through it leaving these kinds ghostly trails. Super fascinating topic!

 

[Pucky Freak]

It was very interesting to see red tide and it’s effects first-hand over the last 2 weeks. I was mostly trying to avoid it as much as possible for outdoor recreation, but I still saw plenty of devastation including rafts of dead sea grass, rafts of dead fish, dying fish, a red-brown algae bloom, and entire flats of dead grass.

It became apparent that there are likely a lot of inter-related factors in the genesis, movement, spread, duration, and intensity of the red tides in the Tampa area such as water temps, salinity, oxygenation, wind direction, intensity, and duration, storm surges, currents, rainfall amounts and timing, other weather events and factors (e.g. Hurricane Fred), ocean floor topography, shoreline topography, timing and selection of humans removing dead sea life, various kinds of pollution, climate change, rising sea levels, whether a bloom has already feasted on a “section” of water and what characteristics that bloom had, including the species of the algae, etc. for starters.

On a very basic level, there is this warm, nutrient-rich surface water in Tampa Bay and the intercoastal waterway and it’s easy to see how algal blooms would naturally occur. Beyond that, there seems to be a fair amount of mostly-educated guesswork involved in trying to figure out how much of a factor the Piney Point incident was on the current red tide. There is no smoking gun, and on the other hand everyone can agree Piney Point was no health salve to the local marine ecosystems.

I can’t wait to return to fish Clearwater again - it was more than worth the trip

Trying my hand on the surf



Had dolphins and manatees swim within touching distance. This was a herd of 6 manatees


Flounder was under the minimum. I made out better on mango snapper.