The great red tide, is also known as algal blooms, because that reddish effect is formed by a large enormous amount of unicellular algae of intense red color that expand in the coastal waters and cause an intense coloration in the surface of the sea.
Blooms can cause great changes in the color of the water, because microalgae have pigments (which allow them to photosynthesize), turning the waters red, yellow, green or brown. For this reason, these phenomena are known worldwide as "red tides".
Red algae
At sea, microalgae, constitute the base of the food chain, since they are the main food of species such as filter feeders. Under certain environmental conditions, such as water temperature, salinity, luminosity and availability of nutrients, these proliferate explosively, causing a phenomenon known as Algal Blooms or "Bloom", which are generally beneficial to marine life.
Practically all of these algae are harmless, but toxic substances in marine waters increase, causing the death of thousands of fish, birds and other mammalian animals with a marine ecosystem. In addition, the red tide deteriorates the vegetation with an ecological impact on the coasts, so that maritime sectors that live from fishing are also harmed.
A red tide is excessive proliferation from microalgae in lakes, rivers, sea or another body of water, produced by the same or different types of microalgae present, achieving a high number of growth (thousands or millions of cells per cubic millimeter).
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