[Rhodes22-list] Red Tide: To Bill (and anyone else who cares to be bored to death)

[Jim White]

Red tide  in the Gulf of Mexico is caused by a planktonic marine dinoflagellate algae, Karenia brevis. This organism is always present in the seawater, but usually in minute quantities. For reasons not well understood, at certain times (and apparently without pattern or triggering mechanism), the organism begins to multiply at an exponential rate, and subsequently micro nutrients in the water (which the bloom is feeding off of) are quickly exhausted, and the organisms begin to die off. 
 
The resultant decomposition products are toxic to many species of fish resulting in localized fish kills, and irritating to sea turtles and marine mammals. Invertebrate filter feeders (down here, things like oysters) concentrate the toxin in their flesh, making the consumption of shellfish hazardous, and potentially fatal following a red tide event, even for some time into the future following the event. It causes a condition called neurotoxic shellfish poisoning (NSP). 
 
The most aggravating effect is when the waves pound the water to a froth, and send a fine mist (aerosol) into the air causing terrestrial critters (like us) to cough uncontrollably, suffer hay fever like reactions and even more severe symptoms like gag reflexs and vomiting. No fun. 
 
A red tide bloom can persist for weeks.
 
We also have anoxic fish kills, but mainly they occur in our two stream systems which empty into the Gulf of Mexico and the Laguna Madre respectively. The water heats up well into the 90's and the O2 layer becomes stratified, then if a vessel comes along and churns up the anoxic level, 02 falls below the critical minimum and fish die. Ironically, in the Laguna Made lots of critters have evolved to handle low 02/high salinity as the embayment is shallow (averaging <3 feet) and has limited circulation. The fresh water critters, and sensitive salt water species such as snook and speckled trout have not.
 
Cheers
jw

Bill Effros <bill at effros.com> wrote:
Jim,

You keep mentioning the aerosol from the red tide. Is it red? Tell me 
more about it. I have never seen it, or heard of it until your 
mention. I gather what it is, but I'm just guessing. We have blooms up 
here. Our water sometimes gets hot enough to kill all the oxygen and we 
get fish kills. But it's never 90 degrees. 80 degrees would be getting 
way up there for us. Clearly, it's quite something. If you could point 
me, or tell me more about it, I'd love to learn.

Glad things turned out better than they might have down there.

Bill Effros

Jim White wrote:

>Bill:
>The USACE administers sections 10 and 404 of CFR 33, the Safe Rivers and Harbors Act. The EPA along with the appropriate state agencies (here, the TCEQ...Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, another real beauracratic do nothing agency) administers the Clean Water Act, but of course, ACE gets its hand in there too. 
> 
>It's exactly what I was getting at...the government makes the individual jump through sequentially higher hoops to obtain permission to utilize aquatic resources, but they themselves are not subject to their own rules.Ironic.
> 
>We are cleaning up an increadible mess here, the surge from Rita was so big that it destroyed sections of the park...something we didn't see with Emily (which was much closer, albiet weaker) and Katrina...in fact I can't remember this much destruction from a storm so far away..., intriguing...
>THe sell is still 10-15 feet and the aerosol from red tide is overpowering.
>jw
>
>Bill Effros wrote:
>Jim,
>
>I believe the USACE administers the Clean Water Act, among others, in 
>which it decides who gets permits, and who doesn't. Congress was so 
>suspicious that it created the ability of citizens to challenge the 
>permits if the citizen felt the corps had issued permits it shouldn't have.
>
>One can argue which permits should and shouldn't be issued, but that is 
>not really what I was talking about. It is your paragraph 3 that 
>concerns me..can do anything they want...permits issued to itself. Junk 
>science. Junk engineering. No oversight. No review.
>
>I also agree with your paragraph 5, we allowed reach and authority...
>
>Lenny Bruce used to do an incredible piece on this topic, talking about 
>the origin of this problem in cave man days. It was really brilliant, 
>and I won't give it away with a poor synopsis if you don't know it. I 
>think I have it on a red vinyl 33 rpm record...somewhere. Slim--do you 
>know what I'm talking aboot?
>
>Bill Effros
>
>Jim White wrote:
>
> 
>
>>Actually Bill
>>It's been my experience (at least in the last several years) that the USACE is a major factor down here in NOT allowing things to be built. Some of the permits I am working on are over two years old, and not approved. I have one client who has been going round and round with them for over nine years.
>>
>>They work in conjunction with lots of other agencies, such as NMFS, USFWS, and others to ensure that the regulated community (us) is "in complience" with the plethora of regulations that justify their existence.
>>
>>However, it has also been my experience that the USACE can, and does do just about anything they want to....if they want to generate dredge spoil and dump it on the private shoreline of the King Ranch, well, they are a federal agency (read: government) and will do so....likewise if they want to dump the same spoil on acres and acres of seagrasses which they make me mitigate on a 3:1 ratio if they even allow me to disturb it at all, they will, all in the name of "public good"
>>
>>The USACE is just another bureaucracy that one must deal with in order to get something done that would be easier to do without the governmental interference in the first place.
>>
>>We allowed the federal government to have the reach and authority it has, and it certainly didn't happen in the recent past, it is a situation that has developed over years of us citizenry being asleep at the wheel. We also have the ability to change it - it's called our voice and vote.
>>
>>Just my lowly opinion.
>>Cheers
>>jw
>>
>>Bill Effros wrote:
>>Rik,
>>
>>Not to beat a dead horse, but I just saw the water is flooding back into 
>>New Orleans again. 
>>
>>Apparently the water never over-topped the levees in the first place. 
>>The last I saw, the levees were not built properly, and simply broke.
>>
>>To me, and I think Brad, we can argue the merits of whether the levees 
>>should be there or not all day; but once that fight has been fought, and 
>>the levees are in place, it is the responsibility of somebody to ensure 
>>that the levees are built properly. 
>>
>>I have long had a lot of trouble with the Army Corps of Engineers. As 
>>far as I'm concerned, it's a pork barrel outfit doing a pork barrel job 
>>with port barrel results. 
>>
>>Sure, they have done some things well, even admirably. But you can't 
>>trust a word they say, because their ultimate goal is to just keep 
>>building, regardless of the merits of the project.
>>
>>Pretty fiscally conservative, huh?
>>
>>Bill Effros
>>__________________________________________________
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>>
>>
>>Jim White
>>Le Menagerie
>>www.lemenagerie.blogspot.com
>>
>>---------------------------------
>>Yahoo! for Good
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>>
>>
>>
>> 
>>
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>Jim White
>Le Menagerie
>www.lemenagerie.blogspot.com
> 
>---------------------------------
>Yahoo! for Good
> Click here to donate to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort. 
>__________________________________________________
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>
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Jim White
Le Menagerie
www.lemenagerie.blogspot.com
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