Massive algae blooms threaten Lake Erie

[BeatleBoot]

http://www.detnews.com/article/20091010/METRO/910100364/Massive-algae-blooms-threaten-Lake-Erie

<snip>

Lake Erie is under attack from algae in a way not seen since the late 1960s and early 1970s. And this is more than just an aesthetic problem. Among the species of algae that are fouling beaches, harming wildlife and threatening drinking water is a toxic form that has scientists around the lake scrambling to control it.

That form -- known as Microcystis or blue-green algae -- is prevalent enough to be seen by from space as it clogs parts of the western half of Lake Erie. More than 25 miles of the lake's coastline is in Michigan and most of Metro Detroit falls in the Lake Erie watershed.

Lakes throughout the region are increasingly encountering problems caused by algae. In Lake Huron, increases in Spirogyra and Cladophora prompted the state to enact the Saginaw Bay Coastal Initiative to identify and address the factors causing the growth, but Huron's problems don't include significant blue-green algae.

<snip>

The dangerous algae began cropping up on Lake Erie in the mid-1990s, the first algae to pose a real problem in decades. Since then, each year has been progressively worse in the western half of the lake. In 2006, another kind of algae, the nontoxic Lyngbya, began appearing as well.

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[ensho]

1. when I was a kid Lake Erie's water was so cold in summertime that you

turned blue in no time. seriously. not kidding. no algae.


This is very bad news.

[dipsydoodle]

2. Strips oxygen from the water

and as such kills all fish quite aside from other adverse issues.

[safeinOhio]

3. Help save my walleye and perch, please.

[dipsydoodle]

6. On smaller lakes

maybe even the size of Cumberland KY bales of hay tethered in the water create a biological action which helps prevent algae build up. We use it in abundance in the carp lakes in which I fish here in the UK.

If by chance you wonder HTF someone from the UK knows Cumberland I've swum in it. :)

[ensho]

7. interesting, didn't know about the hay

nt

[dipsydoodle]

8. Apparently it needs to be barley straw

which as it decomposes releases small amounts of hydogen peroxide which is harmful to algae but not other plant life or fish. :shrug:

[VenusRising]

9. The fish from there are delicious.

My family puts a few boats in the lake every summer.

[TxRider]

4. I thought algea consumed C02?

[dipsydoodle]

5. barrier to oxygen exchange between the atmosphere and water

Some notes here : http://www.freedrinkingwater.com/water_quality/quality2/j-11-08-algae-blooms-cause-severe-oxygen-depletion.htm