What Is Red Tide ?
Many people ask “what is red tide and why does it happen?” Well, hopefully the information on this page will help clear up most questions or concerns about red tide in general. The graphic below will first explain what red tide is along with some other facts and then the text below that will explain the different phases of red tide and why predicting red tide itself is very difficult. (Note: You may need to zoom in on the graphic below if you have trouble reading the words)
Red Tide Info Graphic
Now that you know more about what red tide is, now you will learn about the timing when it comes to red tide and also, the different phases of red tide.
It is important to note that as of right now we have no way of legitimately predicting/forecasting red tide. This means that we unfortunately don’t know how long certain blooms will last and/or the intensity of each bloom. For example, blooms could range from weeks to months at a time and they can range from low levels to high levels depending on location.
When it comes to the different phases of red tide, there are 4 main stages. I will briefly summarize them below:
- Stage 1: Red tide populations first begin to accumulate in the waters.
- Stage 2: The population continues to grow and multiply. As time goes on levels could be high enough to begin to negatively impact wildlife in the waters.
- Stage 3: Once the bloom is large enough the wind and ocean currents control where it moves. Sometimes these blooms can linger in certain areas for days, weeks and months.
- Stage 4: This is the final stage where things begin to improve and/or dissipate. This stage can be further advanced due to quicker moving waters, high wind speeds, thunderstorms over the gulf, and possibly colder water temperatures as well.
Even though we may not be able to predict these red tide blooms, I can say that scientists are continuing to explore ways that we can get a better handle on when these blooms could occur in the future. Similar to how we are continuing to work on improving future weather forecasts.
Hopefully this clears up most questions and concerns about red tide. But, if you do still have further questions then please don’t hesitate to reach out! You can send a message at the contact page of this site or on Facebook! Also, if you’d like to know what the current red tide levels are right now then please see the Red Tide Report page!