Algae Blooms

Recent blooms of potentially toxic algae in the region's waterways have state officials warning people away from the greenish scum, which can get as thick as pea soup and sicken humans and animals. Concerns sent state officials yesterday rushing to test the Chesapeake Bay's waters off Sandy Point State Park near Annapolis - a false alarm, it turned out, after the results came back negative for blue-green algae, said Peter J. Tango, a program manager tracking the algae blooms. The tests, prompted by reports of blue-green algae in the bay from the park south to the Thomas Point Lighthouse, were the state's latest response to complaints about Microcystis algae.

In Harford County White Hall man dies after one-car crash in Jarrettsville JARRETTSVILLE - A 19-year-old man died in a hospital early yesterday after his car - clocked at 95 mph as it passed a state trooper - ran off Route 152 near Jarrettsville and struck a telephone pole, police said. The driver, identified as David A. Svec of White Hall, was traveling north when his 1990 Acura Integra passed the trooper and then ran off a curving section near the end of the road at Jarrettsville Pike, according to Maj. Greg Shipley, a state police spokesman.

After a spate of bad news about the Chesapeake Bay's health, here's an uptick: the "dead zone" that forms every spring is smaller than average so far this year. Water sampling done in early June by the Department of Natural Resources found dissolved oxygen levels too low to be suitable for fish, crabs and shellfish in just 12 percent of the bay, according to the department's " Eyes on the Bay " web site. That's well below the long-term average since 1985 of 17.1 percent of the Chesapeake experiencing low oxygen levels.  It's also a dramatic improvement over last year, when fully a third of the bay's waters were starved of the oxygen that fish, crabs and shellfish need to breathe.

The algae blooms fouling Baltimore area waters apparently have claimed more victims, as more dead fish have been spotted floating in the Inner Harbor and washing ashore at Fort McHenry just south of downtown. Investigators with the Maryland Department of the Environment , who saw upwards of 100,00 dead fish in creeks south of the city Wednesday and hundreds more in Dundalk, confirmed the Inner Harbor die-off today. MDE spokesman Jay Apperson said the harbor's mahogany colored water fit the same recipe for a fish kill.  He offered no estimate of how many dead fish there were, noting that the city's trash-skimming boats were scooping them up, "but as soon as they go by, there's more.

Increasing corn production is expected to spawn an oxygen-starved "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico larger than anything seen in 23 years of recordkeeping - an 8,800-square-mile area, roughly the size of New Jersey - researchers said yesterday. "It's had a disastrous effect on the fisheries for sure," said R. Eugene Turner, a research scientist with Louisiana State University. An increase in corn production to manufacture ethanol-based fuels has jacked up the nutrients flowing down the Mississippi River to the gulf, where they deplete oxygen in the water, Turner said.

The large number of fish kills and toxic algae blooms in the Chesapeake Bay this summer demands "immediate action," the Chesapeake Bay Foundation said yesterday in urging new funding to address the problem. Forty-five fish kills in Maryland's portion of the estuary from June to early August killed tens of thousands of menhaden, perch and other species, according to a new report by the organization titled "Bad Waters." A "significant portion" of the fish kills were linked to the toxic algae Karlodinium, the report says.

The Columbia Association Board of Directors decided last night to join the University of Maryland in a study aimed at improving the quality of Wilde Lake, which has suffered from harmful algae blooms in recent years.The association and Howard County government will contribute $18,750 each to participate in the $75,000, one-year stream channel study, evaluating ways to reduce stream erosion and the transport of sediment into Wilde Lake from its 1,200-acre watershed.The watershed includes most of Wilde Lake Village, the Longfellow neighborhood of Harper's Choice Village and the Beaverbrook community.

Heavy rains and snow melt have flooded the Chesapeake Bay, fouling it with nutrients and sediment, spurring record algae blooms and risking at least a temporary setback in its improving water quality.The deluge could worsen the "dead zone" that chokes the deep waters of the bay each summer and could deal another blow to the estuary's struggling underwater grasses and oyster population.Experts differ over how -- or even whether -- blue crabs and fish might be affected by the weather-related phenomenon.

Levels of the two nutrients that cause poor water quality and algae blooms in Chesapeake Bay have risen, reversing a decade of decline or stability, according to a new analysis by the Environmental Protection Agency.However, an EPA official said that because the changes seem to result from natural causes rather than pollution caused by human activities, they may not inflict major harm.The analysis found a 10 percent increase in nitrogen compared with levels in 1984. Levels of phosphorus, which had declined 16 percent from 1984 through 1992, are back where they were a decade ago, said William Matuszeski, director of EPA's Chesapeake Bay program office in Annapolis.