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The state has stopped aquaculture farmers in lower Tampa Bay from harvesting because of fears of Red Tide blooming in the area.
Leases for cultivating shellfish such as oysters and clams were closed at sunset on May 26, according to Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services spokesperson Franco Ripple. The local industry is small. There are 10 aquaculture leases held in the affected part of lower Tampa Bay, Ripple wrote in an email.
Four water samples this week showed bloom levels of Red Tide offshore, generally around Port Manatee. The Florida Department of Health in Hillsborough County issued a health advisory, warning of the possibility for fish kills and for people to experience respiratory irritation because of Red Tide blooms in lower and middle Tampa Bay.
Shellfish are filter feeders, and harvesting closures are typically an early response when samples suggest tainted water. This particular shutdown came after a sample showed high levels of the organism in Red Tide off Joe Island, near the Sunshine Skyway Bridge.
“This is exactly what I started sounding the alarm on two months ago,” said Brian Rosegger, co-founder of Lost Coast Oyster Company in Tampa Bay. He has worried about a toxic algal bloom cropping up and cutting into his business ever since approximately 215 million gallons of polluted wastewater were pumped into the bay from the old Piney Point fertilizer plant property in early April.
That water contained elevated levels of nitrogen, which can encourage blooms to grow. The release alone would not cause Red Tide, which is naturally occurring, to show up in Tampa Bay, scientists have said. But the nutrients in the polluted water could serve as fuel for the organisms in Red Tide, according to researchers.
Samples this week have shown very low to low concentrations of Red Tide in multiple parts of the bay, and medium concentrations in the four sites roughly west and north of Port Manatee.
“I can’t sell anything right now,” Rosegger said of his oyster crop. “It’s all in the water.”
If the closure lasts just a week or two, he said, his business should be fine. But a months-long pause might be more damaging.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission did not report fish kills around Tampa Bay on Wednesday but said respiratory irritation suspected to be tied to Red Tide had been reported the previous week in Pinellas County.
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