Algae suffocates hundreds of mullet

BY JIM WAYMER
FLORIDA TODAY

Fish kill. Dead mullet -- some more than a foot long -- float near the canal banks Tuesday between the Summers Creek subdivision and River Palms Mobile Home Park on Merritt Island.

Report sightings
To report a fish kill, call the state's hot line at (800) 636-0511.

MERRITT ISLAND - Hundreds of bloated mullet floated in a canal between the Summers Creek subdivision and River Palms Mobile Home Park, victims of algae that hogged oxygen from the water.

It was this summer's first significant fish kill in the Indian River Lagoon.

"The water's pretty stagnant," said Kim Kaufeld, a biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission in Melbourne. "It happens in the summer."

Kaufeld drew water tests this week that confirmed the low oxygen in the water. Hundreds of mullet -- some more than a foot long -- floated along the canal banks Tuesday as tarpon gulped the surface for air.

Rain, runoff and overcast days can trigger more algae to grow and starve fish of oxygen, said Christy Stephenson, a biological scientist with the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute in St. Petersburg.

The landlocked canal, just south of the State Road 520 bridge, is loosely connected to the Banana River.

The lagoon commonly sees fish kills because of its low circulation and an influx of nutrients from lawn fertilizers, grass clippings and other contaminants that can spur excess algae growth.

Stephenson said there were no other reported fish kills in the lagoon this week.

On June 3, low oxygen was suspected of killing more than 100 blue crab, sheepshead, catfish, horseshoe crab, mullet, bass and bream in a golf course pond at Port Malabar Country Club in Palm Bay, after four days of overcast skies and rain, according to the state's fish kill database.

State biologists are investigating shrimp with a condition called "milk," or "cotton" shrimp. State wildlife officials say the parasitic infection -- which eats away at the shrimp's flesh -- is common.

But they want to know if it's infecting shrimp at a higher rate than usual. Biologists say eating infected shrimp is not a health risk but can foul the taste of the meat.

On Florida's west coast, a severe red tide killed fish from New Port Richey to Sarasota.

Hurricane Dennis stirred up more sediment and may have worsened an already existing red tide.

"You can see fish kills up to two weeks after a hurricane," Stephenson said.

Fair Use Disclaimer

The Pelican Island Audubon Society web site, www.pelicanislandaudubon.org, is a nonprofit, noncommercial web site that, at times, may contain Copyrighted material that have not always been specifically authorized by the Copyright owner. The Society makes such material available in its efforts to advance the understanding of issues related to Florida’s natural environment in hopes of helping to find solutions for those problems. It believes that this constitutes a “fair use” of any such Copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. Persons wishing to use Copyrighted material from this site for purposes of their own that go beyond “fair use” must first obtain permission from the copyright owner.

All articles are copyrighted by the respective newspapers.