Late summer is when we wind up seeing those unwelcome blooms of cyanobacteria and algae in western Lake Erie.
But right now, spring, is when the blooms are set up by a sort of equation: fertilizer plus spring rain equals phosphorus loading, which leads to those late-summer algal blooms.
Nate Manning, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan's Graham Sustainability Institute, joined Stateside to discuss what causes algal blooms, why spring and early summer are so important for the late summer blooms, and what makes Lake Erie such a special ecosystem.
Listen above.
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