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HAB Ecological Forecasting Examples

Alexandrium in the Gulf of Maine

A decade of NOAA funded research on Alexandrium in the Gulf of Maine has resulted in coupled biological/physical models that can forecast where and when a toxic bloom will spread, giving state officials early warning of an approaching bloom so they can mitigate impacts on the public and the economy. ECOHAB research products, including fundamental knowledge of Alexandrium ecology and new molecular methods for detecting and mapping Alexandrium in almost real time, are critical for modeling Alexandrium population dynamics. Operational demonstrations of the utility of these new detection methods and biological/physical models have occurred since 2004.  Additionally, the first annual forecast accurately predicted the larger than normal PSP event in 2008. Click here to see an article in WHOI's Oceanus magazine on the model.

Pseudo-nitzschia in the Pacific Northwest

With five years of support from CSCOR’s MERHAB Program, the Olympic Region Harmful Algal Bloom (ORHAB) partnership was formed involving Federal, state, and local management agencies, coastal Indian tribes, marine resource-based businesses, public interest groups, and academic institutions.  ORHAB ultimately developed and adopted a combination of techniques to provide managers an effective early warning of domoic acid toxicity in shellfish, caused by blooms of the toxin diatom Pseudo-nitzschia.  The forecasts generated by ORHAB are now sustained through state funding and have increased the commercial, subsistence, and recreational harvest of razor clams while minimizing the health risks to consumers.  A long term ECOHAB project goal in the Pacific Northwest is to build on this knowledge and develop a mechanistic basis for longer-term forecasting of Pseudo-nitzschia blooms . Researchers in this region are testing the hypothesis that Pseudo-nitzschia events affecting Olympic coastal communities are largely caused by toxic Pseudo-nitzschia sp. growing in the vicinity of the Juan de Fuca eddy and being subsequently transported to nearshore waters by storms. Investigators are looking at the variability of this eddy (size, location, intensity) and at the timing and frequency of storms with respect to presence of the Pseudo-nitzschia sp. Results will benefit coastal managers by providing insights into possible predictors of toxic Pseudo-nitzschia and by helping identify oceanic/atmospheric conditions favorable for the transport of toxic Pseudo-nitzschia onshore where it frequently is transferred up the food chain impacting higher order marine mammals and humans.

Karenia brevis in the Gulf of Mexico

NOAA's HAB Forecasting System in the Gulf of Mexico integrates satellite imagery, field observations, and buoy data to provide information on the location, extent, and potential for development or movement of harmful algal blooms in the Gulf of Mexico. The NOAA HAB Bulletin is distributed twice weekly to the management community, allowing early warnings to limit public exposure and to more effectively target sampling. The Bulletin is a collaborative effort of NOAA Center for Coastal Monitoring and Assessment, NOAA CoastWatch, and NOAA Coastal Services Center and is operational in NOAA's Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services (CO-OPS). In addition, several years of research supported by the ECOHAB Program helped to develop this HAB forecasting system and have produced an in-water sensor that can detect the Florida red tides and is used as a supplemental source of data. The MERHAB Program has supported the State of Florida to collect monitoring data used to ground truth the operational HAB Bulletin in Florida. MERHAB has also sponsored efforts to adapt and expand the HAB Bulletin into Texas waters.