Great Bay Coast Watch Volunteers Discover Toxic Algal Blooms: Extension “Citizen Scientists” complement the work of experts

The volunteers of Great Bay Coast Watch (GBCW) call them “bad guys,” scientists call them harmful algal blooms (HABs), and the press and public generally use the term “red tide.” But whatever the name, the worst bloom of toxic algae in decades arrived in the spring of 2005.

Since June of 1999, GBCW volunteers have been sampling coastal waters to capture, examine, and identify the renegade single-celled algae that create these toxic blooms, whose presence may necessitate shutting down shellfish harvesting operations to protect public health.

This spring, data collected by GBCW volunteers gave a heads-up about an emerging bloom to New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services (NHDES) Shellfish Program personnel. Ideally, volunteers find the toxic algae cells before shellfish ingest enough to become toxic; however, this spring’s HAB arose so quickly and at such high concentrations, volunteer sightings coincided with elevated toxin levels in shellfish tested at the state NHDES laboratory.

Good things in small packages
Phytoplankton, the common term for single-celled marine algae, provide the ultimate example of a “good thing in a small package.” Cells are so small that they are invisible to the naked eye, yet so exquisitely beautiful artists have copied them in stained glass. Individual species take several forms, among them: opalescent ovals punctuated with thousands of tiny holes, pill-box-like chains with protruding spines, and plated-and-grooved “spaceships” with flickering flagella. (See figures 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6).

Millions of phytoplankton can exist in a single drop of sea water, inhabiting a tiny world all but invisible. Through the process of photosynthesis, microscopic “meadows” of single-celled plants sustain the entire food web of the oceans. The lives of all animals that live in the sea depend on phytoplankton for energy and minerals. Phytoplankton photosynthesis is a key element of the global carbon cycle, which regulates the temperature of our planet and produces life-sustaining oxygen. Perhaps no other group of organisms plays such a major role in maintaining life on Earth.

Toxic “blooms
A “bloom” happens when conditions allow algae to multiply very fast and accumulate in dense, sometimes visible patches. Blooms of toxic algae (HABs) are what GBCW volunteers look for.

Like handsome strangers wearing black hats, the presence of toxic cells spells trouble. Scientists don’t know why these “bad guys” out of an estimated 20,000 different phytoplankton species produce toxins. When toxic cells are abundant in the water, filter feeders like shellfish will consume them and concentrate the toxins, which can then be passed along the food chain. Humans who eat the now- contaminated shellfish can get sick or even die.

Of the six types of potentially toxic cells that GBCW volunteers look for, Alexandrium species are always toxic and are the culprits that caused this spring’s event.

People who eat shellfish harboring elevated levels of Alexandrium-produced toxins can suffer Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP). PSP symptoms range from tingling of the lips to, in rare cases, respiratory system arrest and death. Coastal states spend millions of dollars annually to identify HAB-contaminated shellfish before the shellfish can be sold and endanger public health.

Volunteers as early warning system
Using volunteers to act as an early warning system for HABs began in California in 1991. Theorists opined that since it was possible to train citizens as enemy plane spotters in WWII, it was also possible to train people to use simple methods (e.g., plankton net and field microscope) to identify incoming toxic cells before the filter-feeding clams and mussels became contaminated.

In 1999, supported by a grant from the New Hampshire Coastal Program and with training provide d by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, New Hampshire became the third U.S. coastal state to use volunteers as citizen scientists to collect data on harmful algal blooms.

Many people briefly harbor a desire to be a scientist and “go where no man has gone before” or travel the seas as Jacques Cousteau did on the Calypso. Few pursue it because they think scientists are smarter, braver, or somehow different. The GBCW phytoplankton program allows all its volunteers to be scientists. The work is exacting and sometimes tedious, but rewards volunteers with small discoveries and, on rare occasions, a breakthrough. Comrades work side by side looking for the” bad guys.” Weeks and months go by without an observation—then there is a tidal wave of sightings and everyone becomes recharged.

Training volunteer phytoplankton monitors
Training volunteers to collect water quality information, fill out data sheets, and use microscopes to identify the six toxic or potentially toxic cells out of the thousands possible presents challenges. For some, just looking through the eyepiece of a microscope and seeing more than their eyelashes is the first step.

GBCW trains all its new volunteers first in the classroom at UNH’s Kingman Farm, then in a cooperative training, then with their Maine counterparts in April at the Darling Marine Center in Walpole, Maine, and finally in the field.

Although the process may seem intimidating at first, most volunteers quickly learn identification methods and develop an eye for spotting anything unusual in their samples. One of us (Cooper) has developed photo-ID sheets to help in the process.

Each volunteer then becomes part of a team assigned a sampling site along the New Hampshire coast. Each team collects data weekly and sends it to the GBCW office at Kingman Farm. Potentially toxic cells observed are immediately reported to the coordinator, who relays the information to the N.H. Shellfish Program personnel ultimately responsible for the management of shellfish beds.

GBCW communicates with other scientists and with the public
During this year’s substantial HAB event, GBCW established daily communication and shared observations with scientists from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, the University of Massachusetts in Dartmouth, Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Water Resources Administration monitoring team, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the Maine Department of Marine Resources, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Office of Seafood Safety.

GBCW also seeks to educate the public about marine issues. The world of phytoplankton is a wonderful means of introducing students and adults to ocean food webs, the impacts of coastal pollution, and the use of satellite imagery to determine ocean productivity. Home-schooled students hav e become monitors; other students have used their phytoplankton data for science fair projects. Phytoplankton monitoring has been offered as a school enrichment activity. GBCW volunteers have for three years presented programs about phytoplankton to all the fifth grade students at the Portsmouth Middle School and to other school groups through Cooperative Extension’s Marine Docent Program.

You can learn more about the dangers of HABs from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.

By Candace Dolan, Phytoplankton Monitoring Program Coordinator, and Steve Cooper, GreatBayCoast Watch volunteer.

Phytoplankton photos by Steve Cooper; at 400x magnification. Other photos by Candace Dolan.

The Great Bay Coast Watch(GBCW)
The Great Bay Coast Watch (GBCW) was founded in 1990 as part of the University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension/Sea Grant citizen outreach and education program. More than 100 adult and teenage volunteers work to protect the long-term health of New Hampshire ’s coastal environment through volunteer water monitoring. Additional program funding and phytoplankton project support is provided through grants from the New Hampshire Coastal Program (NHCP) and New Hampshire Estuaries Project (NHEP).

NHDES Shellfish Program
Since 2001, GBCW has been helping NHDES manage a paralytic shellfish poisoning (PSP) sampling site at Star Island, Isles of Shoals. Since blooms of toxic Alexandrium species tend to move in from offshore waters, the Star Island site is ideal as it is six miles from the NH coast. Because there are few easily accessible mussels at the island, volunteers collect mussels from the plentiful mussel beds in Hampton Harbor and place them in mesh bags that are transported out and left to hang from the Star Island docks. Left to filter-feed for at least a week, the mussels collect whatever toxins may be present. Volunteers then collect and transport the mussels to the NHDES laboratory in Concord for testing.

Phytoplankton Photo ID
Identification of phytoplankton species is difficult, especially using portable field microscopes. The images aren’t as sharp as those of lab equipment, and field scopes are subject to harsh field conditions.

Two years ago, the only field aids available to GBCW volunteers were marginal black-and-white photos and small line drawings, both vastly different from the images one sees in the field. Today, volunteers have full-color, lifelike photo-ID sheets that make their job much easier.

These sheets, developed by long-time GBCW volunteer Steve Cooper, evolved slowly. According to Cooper, “In 2003, I was involved in a UNH project that required volunteers to analyze once-per-week ocean samples by determining plankton species and quantities in a fixed amount of seawater. I began taking photographs in the lab to help identify many off-shore species I had never seen before. It soon dawned on me that this concept could be useful for our coastal samplers.”

Cooper combined photos taken in the lab with others he took in the field using coastal samples. He used these photos, along with a few from other sources, to design a pictorial document to be used in the field.

The fun part? “It soon became a real quest to get good photos of all the species that the volunteers see,” Cooper says. “Sort of a Peterson’s Guide to Phytoplankton. Even better is the thrill of seeing beautiful phytoplankton structures under the microscope. Such diversity—the intricacies and beauty embodied in nature never cease to amaze me.”

Posted March 23, 2007