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Cleveland
Plain Dealer...
Algae
solution may be simple
Editorial
September 5, 2011
Parts of Lake Erie are
critically ill.
The signs of sickness float on the surface of its warm and shallow
western
basin: blue-green algae blooms that contain a liver toxin, microcystin.
Signs
warn would-be swimmers to stay out of the water, away from the
undulating scum
off the beach at Maumee Bay State Park.
A
year ago, scientists warned that the
blooms would only worsen.
In
western Ohio, they closed Grand
Lake St. Marys, the state’s largest inland lake, where the
concentration of
microcystins reached more than 2,000 parts per billion. The World
Health
Organization cautions swimmers to stay out of water where
concentrations exceed
20 parts per billion. That safety ratio shrinks to 1 part per billion
for
drinking water.
Today,
parts of Lake Erie sport a
bumper crop of cyanobacteria, or toxic blue-green algae blooms, the
odiferous
offspring of phosphorus flowing from farm runoff down the Maumee and
Sandusky
rivers, according to tests performed by Heidelberg University.
To
protect Ohioans’ health, drinking
water and a $10 billion-a-year tourism trade, this stream of phosphorus
must be
reduced by two-thirds, concludes a team of 12 scientists led by Jeff
Reutter,
director of Ohio State University’s Stone Laboratory and the Ohio Sea
Grant
College Program.
The
scientists believe that goal is
within reach if farmers and homeowners apply such common-sense
safeguards as
using only the amount of fertilizer that is necessary and working that
fertilizer into the soil rather than spraying it over the land,
especially when
the earth is frozen or snow-covered.
The
state needs to encourage farmers
to adopt such practices. OSU extension agents should be equipped to
guide them.
Such
simple solutions could improve
the health of Lake Erie as well as boost the bottom line for farmers
and all
who rely on Lake Erie for their livelihoods, drinking water and
recreation.
Read
it at the Cleveland Plain Dealer
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