Others of us have noticed this over the last few weeks. The Ecology Center's Creek Restoration Project has been clearing an exotic pest plant from the middle reaches of Sonoma Creek, especially around Maxwell Farms Park and below, and this algae bloom was pretty discouraging to see choking the creek as far up and down as we could explore.

Showing my cynical nature, I patiently explained that it was probably a nutrient overloading of the creek. This overloading could occur when too much nitrogen and other growth inducing agents pollute the creek and give things like algae a big boost. This can be due to street run-off, and backyard and hillside runoff that is full of sediment and fertilizer. In addition, there might be low water due to overuse of the limited water in the creek which in turn had resulted in a lack of fresh water to dilute the sediments and fertilizers. I was sure I knew that we had exceeded our limits once again, and nature was again attempting to get our feeble attention.

At the regular gathering of technical professionals and scientists the Ecology Center sponsors, I mentioned my observation and my amateur scientific conclusions. I was only partly correct, I learned from a local aquatic biologist, Lance Morgan, and once more realized that there is a lot more to good science than strong opinions.

He said not to worry, that in fact this was typical for a creek like ours.

He told us that after a season of heavy rain such as we have had, local creeks are flushed clean of most of their aquatic invertebrates. "Invertebrates" are technically just animals without an internal skeleton such as we have. These aquatic invertebrates are the mostly tiny insect larvae that live in some quantity in a healthy creek. They eat algae. A local flyfisherman will reach around or under a rock in the water and show you what a Caddisfly or Mayfly look like as a larvae or nymph. They know that these insects and others like them are the staple diet of the steelhead trout who spawn and spend their first year in the creek here. The biologist also said that the lack of these invertebrates meant that the algae didn't have the animals around who normally eat it, and so it was able to flourish, in a big way. Next year, though, all things going as is normal, these insects will be back to eat the algae, and the creek will run clear again.

Amazing how everything does link to everything else.