On our way out in the archipelago of Stockholm.
Now my trip around parts of Europe have taken me to London, traveling with the train through the tunnel under the English Channel.
Before leaving for the continent I took the boat ride to the archipelago outside Stockholm. Trees and flowers are in full bloom, making the archipelago one of the most beautiful places I can think of. But unfortunately flowers aren’t the only thing blooming here.
This spring algal bloom in the Baltic Sea, east of Sweden, has been one of the heaviest in 15 years, according to a report by the environmental organization World Wide Fund for nature, WWF.
One million truckloads
The algae are a normal part of the sea ecosystem, serving as food for small animal plankton, but when nutrient pollution from agriculture, municipal waste water and the combustion of fossil fuels fertilize the water, algae grow into enormous proportions. According to WWF, spring bloom produces about one million truckloads of algae in the Baltic sea.
The spring bloom is not as visible as the summer algal bloom, which a few years ago transformed the Swedish eastern archipelago into a muddy mush, making swimming a bad idea, since the algae is toxic. But the type of alga which is growing at this time of the year can have even more severe effects on the sea bed when it dies and sinks, consuming all the oxygen in the water during its process of decay. The result is dead sea beds, where nothing can live.
An issue of high priority
WWF is now calling for immediate action to save the inland sea.
The Swedish government has promised that the Baltic Sea will be one of the main issues that will be addressed during the Swedish presidency of the EU.
– The Baltic will be an example for the whole union of how [a destructive] development in a poisoned sea can be turned around, and of how financing, agricultural and fishery policies can be coordinated to create a better environment, said Swedish minister of environment, Andreas Carlgren when he presented the plan for the presidency.
Unfortunately the spring algae can be a powerful nutrient for summer algae. I hope we won’t have to stay on the beaches this summer.
