Florida Gulf Coast's Algae Crisis Takes A Deadly Turn

[turbinetree]

By TAMARA LUSH, | August 13, 2018 12:55 pm

LONGBOAT KEY, Fla. (AP) — Tons of dead fish. A smell so awful you gag with one inhale. Empty beaches, empty roads, empty restaurants.

A toxic algae bloom has overrun Florida’s southern Gulf Coast this summer, devastating sea life and driving people from the water.

“I’ve never seen it this bad,” said 31-year-old Heather Lamb of Venice. She’s a hairdresser and makeup artist who styled herself as a dead mermaid and posted photos on social media to raise awareness of the problem. “I feel like it cleanses your soul to go to the beach. For me to not be able to go, it’s painful. I think a lot of people take for granted when they live in Florida. Some people save their paychecks for a whole year to come here.”

Red tide — a naturally occurring toxic algae bloom that can be harmful to people with respiratory problems— has spread throughout the Gulf of Mexico, drifting in the water since it began in October. Stretching about 150 miles (240 kilometers), it’s affecting communities from Naples in the south to Anna Maria Island in the north and appears to be moving northward.

The algae turns the water toxic for marine life, and in recent weeks beachgoers have been horrified to find turtles, large fish like goliath grouper and even manatees wash up dead. In late July, a 26-foot long (8-meter-long) whale shark washed ashore on Sanibel Island, which is known for its pristine beaches. In places like Longboat Key, more than 5 tons of dead fish have been removed from beaches. This week, nine dead dolphins were found in Sarasota County, and marine biologists are investigating whether the deaths are related to red tide.

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/florida-gulf-coast-red-tide-algae-crisis

Hey Rick Scott, and Marco Rubio, please tell the residents of Florida how much money did you get from the Sugar Cane producers and the developers....................after all Rubio you voted for one Scott Pruitt EPA (He left in disgrace) and then there is Scott, the fucking scam artist that bilked Floridians out of health care, and now this POS will not say anything because this happened on his watch, which will and can cause people to die, because after all most Floridians have no health care to combat this shit...................

[Achilleaze]

1. republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America

republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America
republican lies about climate change are dangerous for America

[lapfog_1]

4. takes more than climate change...

climate change coupled with nutrients from sugar cane fields and the overgrowth of population centers (urban street runoff plus outflows from sewage treatment plants).

add all of that literal crap with warm water... algae goes wild...

This should be almost as big a story as the wildfires here in the west where I am.

https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/ptuyEeE5Sy.ioIujppic2Q--~A/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjtzbT0xO3c9ODAwO2g9NjAw/

[Achilleaze]

6. Yes, you are correct.

But climate change is a big stinking factor. And it is all the republican WAY, Inc.

[olegramps]

15. It is the Republicans: Feed the Poor Program.

Look how many free fish meals that we have graciously provided to the poor. Where is their gratitude for this magnificent program? The ungrateful Black and Brown welfare rip offs are to lazy to even go down to the beach and collect what we so graciously provided for them out of the goodness of our benevolent party.

[bluestarone]

2. Waiting for the assholes to blame Obama!

I'm sure it's coming!!!! The people of Florida (RUMPS BASE THAT IS) gotta be brain dead!!!

[Achilleaze]

5. Chemical runoff from the freaking sugar cane farms, they say

add torrential rains and high temps: a mess arising out of republican-style "values" concerning the environment. To wit, republican greedheads go for all the money they can, piss all over the planet, and totally crap up the future for children and grandchildren. Then they prisss around claiming that they are "conservatives." Ha ha. Maybe the kremlin would swallow that bullshit, but no decent, honest American.

[Zorro]

23. Rick Scott already blamed the Obama administration

The algae fouling South Florida beaches traces its origin to cattle ranches, farms and neighborhoods as far north as Orlando.

A vast area drains into Lake Okeechobee, where water laden with phosphorus has fertilized the growth of horrific algae blooms that have been discharged to the ocean. The target phosphorus level for the lake is 105 metric tons a year. Last year, the lake received 450.

The problem has been building up over decades, and defies easy solutions.

Gov. Rick Scott has blamed the algae plague largely on the Obama administration's failure to fix the federally controlled dike around the lake, where high water levels necessitated discharges to the ocean to protect the deteriorated earthen structure.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/broward/fl-lake-pollution-20160708-story.html

[Scurrilous]

3. K&R

[Baitball Blogger]

7. The price of Republican leadership.

[montanacowboy]

8. Hey Ricky and Markie (2 super idiots)

How is all that sugar cane $$$$$$$$$$$$$$ working out for you

WHAT THE FUCK IS THE MATTER WITH THE PEOPLE IN FLORIDAH? IT'S ALWAYS SOME GODDAMN THING DOWN THERE

STEALING ELECTIONS, FOULING THE OCEAN, MURDERING SEA LIFE, TAKING AWAY HEALTH CARE

WHAT DOES IT TAKE FOR YOU FUCKING IDIOTS DOWN THERE TO FIGURE IT OUT?

[calimary]

13. I will never understand how ANYBODY votes republi-CON. ANYWHERE, not just Florida.

[DonCoquixote]

30. there are many democrats down here

we tend to be outnumbered, but it does not help when people in safe blue areas just write us off.

[Permanut]

38. Point taken.

We rail at the idiots, and sometimes paint with a broad brush. Sympathies to you behind enemy lines.

[DonCoquixote]

39. thank you

and I assure you, despite the work the GOP puts, we are digging at their foundations, and filling the holes with explosive truth that will detonate whenever these fools ask "why am I making less money?" which, as we know, is all they care about. Greetings from behind the barbed wire

[Submariner]

9. Stop the f*cking complaining Florida

You voted for Scott so he could de-fund the Dept of Environmental Protection and the Water Management Districts so you could eliminate regulations, regulatory enforcement, and most of all, save all those salaries of the people you paid to keep your water clean.

So STFU and bask in the glory of all that money you are saving on paying environmental protection enforcers just for suffering a little odor of dead fish, dead turtle and dead manatee.

You paid for it, you deserve it. My condolences to the fish and wildlife who have to suffer due to the stupidity of Florida humans. Enjoy the hot August sun burning down on the dead fish.

[AllyCat]

11. No doubt here. Wondering if they will EVER get it.

[Rocky888]

18. Not all of us did!

And, most of us who are generational Floridians that go back before the big money and big sugar took over are very environmentally conscience. So, if we are going to attack people here in Florida, you may want to start with the people from other states without a care about our native species. Only the MONEY they can make off our resources. Like people fron Boston!

How many times have you came here and never gave one thought to our environment or native SPECIES.

We were once a Democrat state. Then the retirees from up north came here by the millions and move into there trailer parks and talk about how they hate the people here, then go out and vote Republican, because that’s what they did up there.

[Submariner]

24. Open mouth insert foot

How many times have you came here and never gave one thought to our environment or native SPECIES.

I was there from '98 through '06 preparing for the Everglades restoration project that never happened because your generational governor needed the dough so his brother could blow up Iraq.

I addressed this last week here:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=10981281

and here:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=10981362

And your native species are gone because your Florida aquarium shops and aquarium owners keep flushing non-native species down the drain or releasing boa constrictors and pythons in the glades. Bostonians didn't do that.

[Rocky888]

25. That generational governor you speak of was from Connecticut then Texas, not florida

Look. You can cuss me and say all the hateful things you want. I am well aware of what happened to our state, but unless you are living it, don’t tell me to stfu. My family have always voted for our environment, I didn’t buy pyth9ns or have aquariums and release these species because our family was always conscience of the invasive species.

I have never wished any type of disasters on another human being like you did. And have never voted for any candidate that did not care about our environment.

For you to pretend you care about the Everglades, then tell us to stfu is as insulting as if I told you you deserve the flooding happening up in New England states.

If you hate us here in Florida, that’s fine, but don’t pretend you tried to Save us and then be so hateful. I am 60 fucking years old and as pissed off about this as I can get. I have spent my life saving wildlife and domestic animals here.

And you sir are just a hateful man.

[Mariana]

29. A Democrat state? Really?

And are you seriously claiming Bostonians tend to vote Republican?

[DonCoquixote]

32. no

just that florida was a demo state till the north dumped it's retiree trash here.

[Mariana]

34. The whole South used to be Democratic.

It isn't anymore. Did all those other Southern states turn Republican because of northern retiree trash, too?

[obamanut2012]

36. I just said the same thing today to a coworker

Thank Gawd they are dying off down here -- they have destroyed this state, including voting for Trump. A friend's age is a HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR and voted for Trump, as did all her buddies at her assisted living home in Boca. I am not making this up.

[Rocky888]

33. I never said anything about Bostonians or their voting habits.

my Comment was in reference to Florida going from blue to red decades ago because of how many republicans moved here and changed the state from blue to red. And the Gerrymandering.

I hate everything the republicans have done to my state. I just don’t understand why anyone would think that all the people in one state deserves what has happened here.

[Blue_true]

31. When Florida was a democratic state, the power was largely from racist north

and north-central Florida and even parts of central Florida. Those people long ago became republicans. The Florida Democratic Party is regrowing in south and central Florida and blue northern enclaves like Gainesville, Jacksonville, Tallahassee. This election for my state will be critical, it will tell us how far we have come with the "new" democrats, not the racist trash of the long past (with shout outs to Reuben Askew, Lawton Childs, Bib Graham - they moved the state forward).

[BigmanPigman]

10. Climate Change is one of the factors in this deadly mix.

It will be getting worse and worse all over the planet. This proves that the damage will be local and specific as well as global. Fish were dying in Germany from suffocation due to the extreme hot weather. They had to scoop up tons of dead fish and tried to pump fresh water with oxygen into the rivers to save some from dying. We are going to experience stuff we never even imagined could happen and THAT will be the norm.

Even if all the people on Earth were to stop adding to the CO2 levels completely tomorrow, it would still take several decades to a century to get back to "normal".

[lpbk2713]

12. Scott and Rubio will talk about it.

But they won't do anything about it.They don't want to step on any of the
wrong toes. And after the election is over they will forget about it entirely.

[bigbrother05]

14. Thoughts and prayers for their coastlines

Their greed will kill millions

[Moostache]

16. Genuinely curious here...Does this have any ties to the chemicals from Deepwater Horizon?

I don't know if it does or it doesn't...does anyone have a definitive answer? I just remember being very concerned at the time of the spill that there would be blowback from using the volume of chemicals that were dumped to sink and disperse the oil from the surface...

Maybe it is 100% unrelated, but I was wondering if anyone knows...

[LittleGirl]

19. I don't know if it is but it's probably likely.

check out the tide patterns and I would imagine that oil is penetrating that region.

[EX500rider]

20. Been 8 years so unlikely...the chemicals would have diluted far and wide by now.

[c-rational]

21. No, the answer is more likely Global Climate change...see Bigman Pigman's post 10 above.

[superpatriotman]

17. That it is sugarcane plantations killing nature

couldn't make it any more Banana Republic than it is in Flori-duh!

[Duppers]

22. I know a denier down there quite well.

Only something this bad right under her nose will make her wake up to the fact that the planet has a big problem.

The sad part is that this woman says that she is a Democrat!

smh

[Turbineguy]

26. We elect republicans

because we want to die.

[lindysalsagal]

27. We don't need no stinkin' epa!!!

De-regulate everything! India an China do it!!!

[donkeypoofed]

28. Florida is a Red State

Hope they're enjoying the fruits of their voting efforts. No Repugnicans can help them cause they're already paid off by Big Business and polluters.

[Blue_true]

35. Actually, Florida is a purple state.

It fits the definition. Clinton won it, Gore almost won it, President Obama won it twice. The legislature is mostly republican because of the preponderance of small population red areas and the GOP's gerrymandering. During my lifetime, we have had Reuben Askew, Lawton Childs, Bob Graham, all two term democratic governors - 24 years. You may not recognize it or even care, but the state is slowly moving blue, that would be helped greatly by more innovative technology based businesses forming in the state, some business people are trying to make that happen. So insult the democrats here and look down your nose at us, but one day in the not too distant future, we will be as important a blue state as New York State.