Allen Place, a biochemist at the University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute, has concluded that at least 15 of this summer's fish kills in the Chesapeake Bay were linked to toxic karlodinium algae blooms.  That was the most in recent memory -- although historical comparisons are difficult, because not until recently have scientists looked for this species.  "This was a very productive year for karlodinium, and the fish kills were collateral damage," Place said. 

"Karlo," which forms coffee-colored stains on the bay called "mahogany tide," suffocates fish.  Place believes that karlodinium -- once called by a different name, gyrodinium -- is the little-known organism actually responsible for the much-publicized 1997 fish kills that shut down the Pocomoke River. These were attributed to another toxic algae, Pfiesteria.

Pictured above is karlodinium.

And this is Pfiesteria. Both are similar, in that they are types of algae that are all over the bay and in the oceans. They thrive by devouring other algae that boom in numbers when there's too much fertilizer pollution.  But Place says he's tried repeatedly to get the Pfiesteria to produce a toxin that might cause a fish kill -- and he's been unable to.  But the karlodinium algae readily makes a toxin that kills fish by eating holes in gill cells, making them explode.

Another difference: Karlodinium doesn't hurt people, only fish.  Researchers still debate whether Pfiesteria could have caused the short-term memory loss in 31 people on the Pocomoke River that made the 1997 fish kills international news.

But from a public policy perspective, whether it was one form of toxic algae or another might not matter as much as the fact that fertlizer runoff is killing the bay.

Around the world, too much fertilizer pollution and overfishing are transforming the oceans.  All the larger, advanced organisms -- whales, sharks, cod, etc. -- are disappearing.  They are being replaced by ancient, primordial life forms like algae and jellyfish that thrive in human waste.

It's the "Rise of Slime."  Los Angeles Times reporter Ken Weiss won a Pulitzer Prize earlier this year for documenting the crisis.  The goo is taking over the Pactific Ocean.  And it's oozing across the Chesapeake Bay, too.

If you can't find any blue crabs for your next seafood feast, don't worry -- there's plenty of jelly fish.  I wonder how they'd taste with a little Old Bay seasoning.