The MCHD Environmental Laboratory receives phytoplankton samples as a result of investigations of marine and freshwater conditions. Algae blooms are sometimes described as brown, foamy and smelly or sometimes can appear as green or red, depending on the species present. In the lab, a Sedgewick-Rafter cell is used for enumeration using 200X magnification. Often a higher power must be used with a slide and coverslip for identification of the species. Historical phytoplankton records are available - Click here soon. Records of noteable bloom events have been made into posters using our 1000X digital images of the dominant species. These high resolution images serve to document events and also provide an excellent training tool. Diatom and flagellates seem to follow a seasonal pattern and that pattern can be checked. Harmful algal blooms(HABs), mostly flagellates, must be identified and recorded. The frequency of these HABs has been cited in the literature, as increasing in scope and intensity.

• Algae Reports (Historic and Current Data)
• Cryptophyte: Shrewsbury River and Navesink River May 2007
• Harmful Algae Bloom Links
• Identification of Dinoflagellates in the Raritan Bay
• Identification of Springtime Diatoms in Raritan Bay
• Tribophyceae - A Class of Golden-Brown Algae (freshwater)