Pollution from Lake Okeechobee does not start red tides but may enhance them along the Gulf Coast, according to Mote Marine Laboratory scientists.

“What we are seeing now is not unprecedented, but it is bad,” said Vincent Lovko, a phytoplankton ecologist at Mote. He said cyanobacteria (blue green algae) traveling from the Caloosahatchee includes nutrients used by other organisms in estuaries, sea grass beds and macro-algae and phytoplankton. The amount that actually makes it into the coastal systems is greatly reduced when it reaches the Gulf.

Lovko made his comments before a sold-out crowd Thursday at a “Meet the Minds” panel discussion on red tide presented by Sarasota’s Argus Foundation.