THE RED TIDE — SMITH 373 



NEW OUTBREAKS AND EMPTY HOTELS 



The scourge reappeared later as far north as St. Petersburg and by 

 the time it finally died out in August 1947, more fish had been killed 

 than in the earlier outbreak. 



Faced with a disastrous repetition of beaches littered with dying 

 fish, residents and visitors complaining of irritant gases, and the hotels, 

 motels, and beach resorts changing in a few weeks from prosperous 

 enterprises to almost deserted buildings, there was a great public 

 outcry for action. But the inflexible system of legislation and gov- 

 ernment makes it almost impossible to authorize the moving in of 

 a team of qualified scientists at a moment's notice or even to pro- 

 vide the funds for doing so. 



Fortunately, however, J. N. Darling, a winter resident of Captiva 

 Island and a well-known naturalist, was present at the first outbreak. 

 He not only made his own observations but also with his own funds 

 helped defray the expenses of biologists who set out to investigate the 

 problem during January 1947. 



THE COUNTERATTACK BEGINS 



The appearance of the water immediately suggested the presence of 

 plankton bloom. By examining samples under a microscope it was 

 soon found that a prodigious growth of microscopic organisms had 

 indeed taken place and that one in particular seemed to be more 

 characteristic than others. The credit for first noticing this goes, 

 however, to Mr. Darling, whose curiosity had been aroused by strange 

 little moving blobs of protoplasm which he noticed under a borrowed 

 microscope. Miami scientists recognized this as a type of organism 

 already notorious as a killer of fish when present in plankton blooms. 

 This kind of microscopic sea life passes under the cumbersome general 

 name of "dinoflagellates." 



One of the dinoflagellates, Gonyaulax catenella, was found to be the 

 cause of mussel poisoning along the coast of California during the 

 summer months. Large numbers of this organism in the plankton, 

 when taken in as food by mussels, rendered these shellfish dangerous for 

 human consumption. Others have been found in poison water else- 

 where. One in particular bears the general name of Gymnodinium, 

 and it was this kind which the marine biologists found in Florida 

 red tide. During the investigations as many as 60,000,000 individual 

 cells to the pint of water were found in the affected waters. 



MEET "JIM BREVIS" 



Examination of the Gymnodinium present in the Florida outbreaks 

 showed that it is a 4-lobed blob of almost naked protoplasm, with a 

 whiplike flagellum trailing from one end. Although practically 



