Scientists are studying new algae that have turned up in San Carlos Bay and Pine Island Sound off Sanibel Island. It’s similar to a toxic algae found off the coast of Australia. It’s called Lyngbia and it’s under investigation by researchers at the Sanibel Captiva Conversation Foundation. It first turned up in December and it still persists. Lab Manager Dr. Steve Bortone says there’s a possibility contact with it could cause a rash called swimmers itch – but so far no cases have been reported. He says the primary concern is the impact on sea grasses.

In this particular case they’ve become so abundant they’ve covered over the blades of sea grass – and why that’s a problem is that they interfere with the light the sea-grasses can get and it turns out that blue green algae and sea grass require the same kind of light so it’s literally stealing the light from the sea grass.

Swimmers itch has been reported in Australia – but Bortone says it’s not the same algae. He says growth of blue-green algae is promoted by high nutrient levels.

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A new form of algae is now flourishing off Sanibel in San Carlos Bay and Pine Island Sound. The blue-green algae cling to sea-grasses – blocking the sun. Lab Manager at the Sanibel Captiva Conservation Foundation, Steve Bortone, says the persistent bloom is the result of poor water quality.

it’s a accumulation of a lot of issues, some stuff coming out of the lake, there’s probably some additions from the municipalities there’s septic areas where septic tanks may be overflowing in some cases. It might even be decomposition of materials left behind by the hurricane and those are rotting and putting their nutrients into the system –

Blue-green algae in Australia are toxic and causes swimmers itch, but Bortone says this variety doesn’t appear to do that. What it does do is coat the stems of sea-grass – blocking sunlight, potentially killing the grasses and leading to further deterioration of water quality.

The Environmental Protection Agency is hoping to tap into the knowledge and creativity base of college students to find new solutions to environmental problems. This is the third year the EPA has held its ‘People, Prosperity and the Planet’ competition. The idea is to get college students to form interdisciplinary teams…like chemistry and architecture students working together…in order to find innovative ways of dealing with sustainability issues. Program manager Julie Zimmerman says 50 teams will each get 10-thousand-dollars to spend toward their project during the school year…

“And then in May we bring all the teams to Washington DC and we have essentially a sustainability fair. So they set up a booth or an exhibit of what they’ve been working on. Then we pick the 6 best from there and they get 75-thousand-dollars to move their design into the marketplace, or implement it in the field or bring it to a developing world community.”

Zimmerman says past participants of the EPA program have already started 4 small businesses…including one that measures energy and water use in buildings in real time. She says another past winner is developing sustainable water systems in Honduras. College students have until the end of December to apply.

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The Environmental Protection Agency is seeking applicants for its People, Prosperity and the Planet Competition. The program started three years ago and is for college students who are interested in sustainability issues and the environment. 50 teams will get 10-thousand dollars to work on their projects. 6 winners will then be chosen for 75-thousand dollar grants to help get their idea out into the real word. The E-P-A’s Julie Zimmerman says one group of past winners figured out a way to give people constant feedback on energy and water use in buildings.

“They actually saw a 30-percent increase in conservation when you got the information in real time. And they’ve been hired by Duke University and Sidwell Friends high school here in Washington to install these systems.”

Another past winner designed a better way to process bio-fuel taken from grease traps at restaurants. The contest is open to all college students. The application deadline is December.

Cape Coral’s Mayor is moving ahead with efforts to attract a Major League Baseball team to his city for spring training. Cape Mayor Eric Feichthaler has written a letter to the Cleveland Indians and will send another one to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. He wants the teams to consider Cape Coral to host spring training games in February and March. The Fort Myers area already has the Boston Red Sox and the Minnesota Twins. Speaking on Gulf Coast Live, Feichthaler said it’s time for the Cape to get some of that prestige so its residents don’t have to cross a bridge to see baseball.

“It will lead to the attraction of some really quality jobs to this city. And again will give us an identity. It will put us into the news. It will bring a tax-base that we clearly don’t have today. And most importantly a place that our kids and our families could use twelve months out of the year for all sorts of projects.”

Feichthaler says he won’t raise taxes for a stadium. Instead he wants the team and the state to foot the bill. Cities have until October to request a special pot of state money to attract baseball teams. Feichthaler says a new stadium could be built at Festival Park.

Marine scientists are creating "test-tube coral babies," hoping offspring will take root to help restore part of a coral reef damaged by a ship grounding in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.
A team of University of Miami marine science researchers, led by National Marine Fisheries Service ecologist Margaret Miller is collecting coral eggs and sperm this week during an annual reproductive ritual. Most corals in the Keys, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean release eggs and sperm into the water a few days after the full moon in August. In the wild, eggs and sperm randomly mix and fertilize to become coral larvae. Some of it takes root to serve as foundation blocks for new coral. Miller provides artificial labs on the backs of boats for the fertilization.

“In our case they’re doing it in a dish or in a cooler on the back of the boat and it’s a fairly labor intensive process over several days of changing their water essentially, siphoning off some of the waste products that are in the water and providing them fresh sea water sort of over the next week or so during this phase when they’re little blobs swimming around.”

Beginning this weekend, Miller's team plans to take the larvae to a 400-foot freighter that ran aground off Key Largo in 1984. The grounding destroyed nearly five thousand square feet of corals.
Using money from fines the ship's owners paid, much of the site was restored in 2002, but there has not been evidence of any hard coral growth.

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Marine scientists hope "test-tube coral babies" will take root to help restore a tract of reef ravaged by a 1984 ship grounding off the Florida Keys. This week a team of University of Miami marine science researchers is collecting coral eggs and sperm during an annual
reproductive ritual, dubbed “coral spawning”. National Marine Fisheries Service ecologist Margaret Miller explains what happens next.

“We will be taking these coral larvae of reef building coral species, enclosing them around some of these limestone artificial structures that were built back in that area in the hopes that they will be able to settle and indeed return to being a coral reef in that area as opposed to some limestone structures.”

Looking like an upside-down, underwater snowstorm, most corals in the Keys, Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean release eggs and sperm a few days after the full moon in August. In the wild, eggs and sperm randomly mix and fertilize to become larvae. Some take root to become foundation blocks for new coral.

Cape Coral residents who overpaid for utility expansion projects can expect to see refunds next month. Mayor Eric Feichthaler says costs for the installation of water, sewer and irrigation lines were cheaper than expected -- and residents should have received money back years ago. The refunds follow several audits that were critical of Cape Coral. Speaking on W-G-C-U’s Gulf Coast Live, Mayor Feichthaler said he’s trying to make sure that doesn’t happen again.

“Rather than blame and point fingers, we have to move forward and find ways to ensure that when we do have audits and we have outside views of these types of things, we have very good controls in place where there is no doubt about being fully cooperative, getting out information as quickly as possible and to make sure this lack of communication that we’ve seen never happens again.”

It’s less than three weeks until primary election day and the four main candidates battling to be the next Florida Governor have been trading punches. But you might be surprised to know there are actually a total of nineteen people vying to be governor this year. One of the lesser-known candidates made a stop in Fort Myers Thursday to try to draw attention to a campaign that’s received virtually no publicity. W-G-C-U’s Mike Kiniry has more.

Cape Coral residents who overpaid for utility expansion projects can expect to see refunds next month. Mayor Eric Feichthaler says costs for the installation of water, sewer and irrigation lines were cheaper than expected -- and residents should have received money back years ago. The refunds follow several audits that were critical of Cape Coral. Speaking on W-G-C-U’s Gulf Coast Live, Mayor Feichthaler said he’s trying to make sure that doesn’t happen again.

“Rather than blame and point fingers, we have to move forward and find ways to ensure that when we do have audits and we have outside views of these types of things, we have very good controls in place where there is no doubt about being fully cooperative, getting out information as quickly as possible and to make sure this lack of communication that we’ve seen never happens again.”

Marine scientists are creating "test-tube coral babies," hoping offspring will take root to help restore part of a coral reef damaged by a ship grounding in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.
A team of University of Miami marine science researchers, led by National Marine Fisheries Service ecologist Margaret Miller is collecting coral eggs and sperm this week during an annual reproductive ritual. Most corals in the Keys, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean release eggs and sperm into the water a few days after the full moon in August. In the wild, eggs and sperm randomly mix and fertilize to become coral larvae. Some of it takes root to serve as foundation blocks for new coral. Miller provides artificial labs on the backs of boats for the fertilization.

“In our case they’re doing it in a dish or in a cooler on the back of the boat and it’s a fairly labor intensive process over several days of changing their water essentially, siphoning off some of the waste products that are in the water and providing them fresh sea water sort of over the next week or so during this phase when they’re little blobs swimming around.”

Beginning this weekend, Miller's team plans to take the larvae to a 400-foot freighter that ran aground off Key Largo in 1984. The grounding destroyed nearly five thousand square feet of corals.
Using money from fines the ship's owners paid, much of the site was restored in 2002, but there has not been evidence of any hard coral growth.

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Marine scientists hope "test-tube coral babies" will take root to help restore a tract of reef ravaged by a 1984 ship grounding off the Florida Keys. This week a team of University of Miami marine science researchers is collecting coral eggs and sperm during an annual
reproductive ritual, dubbed “coral spawning”. National Marine Fisheries Service ecologist Margaret Miller explains what happens next.

“We will be taking these coral larvae of reef building coral species, enclosing them around some of these limestone artificial structures that were built back in that area in the hopes that they will be able to settle and indeed return to being a coral reef in that area as opposed to some limestone structures.”

Looking like an upside-down, underwater snowstorm, most corals in the Keys, Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean release eggs and sperm a few days after the full moon in August. In the wild, eggs and sperm randomly mix and fertilize to become larvae. Some take root to become foundation blocks for new coral.

Congressmen Mark Foley paid a visit to the Charlotte County Sheriff’s department Wednesday where he briefed officers on details of new legislation aimed at protecting children from sexual predators.

Passage of the Adam Walch Child Protection and Safety Act in Congress last month coincided with the 25th anniversary of the day 6 year old Adam Walch went missing from a mall in Hollywood Florida. His severed head was found in a ditch near Vero Beach a few days later. Representative Foley told sheriff’s deputies the new law has the teeth to help prevent crimes like that from happening again – including continuous monitoring of individuals serving probation for child sexual violence.

“It’s ironic we put Martha stewart in a bracelet in her 20 million dollar home – and the worst that happened there is maybe one of her cakes fell – but we wanted to make an example of her so we monitored her presence and whereabouts 24-7 – yet we treat those who are sexual predators in a cavalier and casual way.”

Other provisions of the act include a 5 year felony conviction for violating probation and the mandatory registration of all child sex offenders within 72 hours of their release from prison. Foley also praised Charlotte County Law Enforcement for it’s proactive stance in tracking child sexual predators.

The 20 Cubans who came ashore on Marco Island Tuesday are now free. Federal authorities processed and released them all because they reached U-S soil before authorities could intercept them. Speaking today in Port Charlotte, Republican Congressman Mark Foley said this country needs to do a better job policing its borders.

“Not only are we going to have emphasize tightening our borders which we should do anyway. But we’re also going to have to provide a level of protection in the Caribbean and the Gulf Coast and the Atlantic based on what’s happening in Cuba today. Based on what can happen in Haiti on any day in order to enforce and enhance enforcement.”