Fears that poisonous blue-green algae would this summer once again turn the Baltic Sea into a stinking soup have not been borne out, thanks to the cool start to the Nordic summer. Experts had warned last winter that this year's algal blooms could reach record levels, after record-low levels of oxygen were measured in the water. But the algae has so far not been as widespread as first feared.
| Kinda makes you sit down and ponder on the expertise of the experts, dunnit? |
At this time last year, algae was blooming much more fiercely. According to the latest report from the Information Office for the Baltic Proper, no major algae outbreaks have been discovered, with only local outbreaks in parts of the Stockholm Archipelago and the Gulf of Finland. "This is primarily due to two things. First, the temperatures have not been as high as usual in the summers; second, there has been a good deal of wind," said Lasse Gustavsson, secretary general of the Swedish branch of the Worldwide Fund for Nature, WWF. |