Many people are wondering what can be done to remove the red tide plaguing our coastline.
Reports from Sarasota County are showing oysters are actually helping clear up the toxic water.
We spoke to marine biologists at Florida Gulf Coast University to find out if this is true.
“Oysters could be part of the solution, they are not going to cure red tide, but they have a positive effect by reducing the number of red tide cells in the water by eating,” Dr. James Douglass said.
Douglass is a professor of marine and ecological sciences at FGCU.
One oyster can filter up to 50 gallons of water per day, but the volume of water affected by red tide is too high.
“This particular red tide event has everything covered, from the clams inside the sand to flounder we’ve seen all the way through the water column, and what’s very scary is how wide-ranging this is from South Naples to Siesta Key,” FGCU Vester Center resource coordinator Bob Wasno said.
So what can we do to slow or stop the red tide?
Dr. Douglass said it starts with infrastructure.
“Oysters are not the solution, they are more like icing on the cake, you know they can help with some of that finishing touches of cleaning up pollution, but really it’s going to take infrastructures like better sewage plants, stricter regulations on septic tanks and fertilizer use and all those other changes,” Douglass said.
Wasno hopes the effort will hopefully one day soon put an end to dead sea life washing up on shore.
“It’s tough to see what this place used to be 30 years ago and where we are at today and seeing these kinds of things that are happening time and time again,” Wasno said.
The experts we spoke with added that there are fewer oysters in Southwest Florida this summer because Hurricane Irma killed many of them last fall.
They are hopeful that number will rebound as the summer season continues.
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