Blue-Green Algae is Back & Dangerous - Valley News Live - KVLY/KXJB - Fargo/Grand Forks

Our hot summer has brought an unwelcome guest, blue-green algae is popping in parts of Minnesota. It can be toxic for pets, live stock, even you. Valley News Live gives you the ins and outs of the blue-green slime found in some lakes.

It's called blue-green algae and Valley News Live located a substantial patch of the stuff last year. It was right around this time, near Rothsay, Minnesota. It typically forms in shallow lakes that have an overflow of nutrients.

"They're a bacteria that responds to nutrients that are in surface water and they react to sunlight and cause these blooms where the water will turn bright green or blue green." Says Tim James of the Minnesota Pollution Control. Adding that most people know better than to jump into something looking like this, but crazier things have happened. James breaks down what you should look for if you think you have a case of it, "what we tell people is when they're seeing those conditions of dark or blue-green water, low visibility, if it looks bad and smells bad you should avoid contact."

So far James has received about four calls from folks near the Detroit Lakes area from people who believe they might have a case of blue-green algae on their hands. He says the early warm weather plays the most significant role in it's growth, "as everyone knows we've had this pretty long string of hot weather and calm conditions. So the conditions are ripe for this blue- green algae."

In recent years the stuff has been showing up in more and more places. Even though every patch might not be toxic, James says you don't want to find the patch that is, "the bacteria do produce toxins and those toxins can be threatening to people, pets, and live stock's health."

 If this warm weather follows us into the fall James predicts we'll see more and more cases of it. Some symptoms that would likely come up if you got into blue-green algae would be some respiratory problems and skin irritations. It can even kill animals if they drink too much of it. If you find one in full bloom the Minnesota Pollution Control would like to know, we've included a link on our website at valleynewslive.com, just click on the hot button.