What Kind of Pollution is This? Ballyquinn, West Waterford

Hi All,

Went to Ballyquinn in West Waterford for a few casts this afternoon, and discovered the place covered in a type of disgusting yellow scum. As this is a surf beach that traditionally has exceptionally clean water, I was a bit dismayed to find it in such a state. I'm thinking that it might be run-off from the slurry spraying that's been done over the good weather, but I'm not sure. In any event, it starts at exactly the point where the ground water enters the sand at the top of the beach. Also, it's not residue from the tide. See the photo below for details. It's not great, and I had to adjust the contrast to make it visible. The actual scum is far yellower and 'dirty' than the over-whitened representation in the photo.

I've half a mind to go to the Department of the Environment about this, but don't want to make a tit out of myself if there's a natural explanation. Any suggestions welcome!

Lodore

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You should of course raise this with the environment folks: the worst that could happen is that they will come back to say that it's a natural thing. However, the water is still much too cold for something like red tides/algal blooms, so it seems likely that it's man-mad.

http://www.epa.ie/

I met a chap working for the EPA last week in Tramore collecting Water samples , he told me about the website I forgot about it until I read this post .Maybe if you contacted them and alerted them to the polluted area they could inversigate it further . Hope this helps. Craigo .

well lad pity to see that might be from the stream on the eastern end , was there much weed in the surf

You have a pm on this Lodore.

bad weather is the cause of this

Cheers for the comments guys. This is now being followed up by someone involved in pollution monitoring, so if it isn't a natural phenomenon, we'll hopefully see some action on it. Yay!