PICES Scientific Report No. 23 2002 Harmful algal blooms in the PICES region of the North Pacific Edited by F.J.R. “Max” Taylor and Vera L. Trainer August 2002 Secretariat / Publisher North Pacific Marine Science Organization (PICES) c/o Institute of Ocean Sciences, P.O. Box 6000, Sidney, B.C., Canada. V8L 4B2 E-mail: [email protected] Home Page: http://www.pices.int TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword.........................................................................................................................................1 Background and objectives ...........................................................................................................3 Country reviews and status reports Section I. Western North Pacific Japan Yasuwo Fukuyo, Ichiro Imai, Masaaki Kodama and Kyoichi Tamai. Red tides and harmful algal blooms in Japan ................................................................7 People’s Republic of China Tian Yan, Ming-Jiang Zhou and Jing-Zhong Zou. A national report of HABs in China.............................................................................................................21 Republic of Korea Sam Geun Lee, Hak Gyoon Kim, Eon Seob Cho and Chang Kyu Lee. Harmful algal blooms (red tides): Management and mitigation in Korea..................39 Russia Tatiana Y. Orlova, Galina V. Konovalova, Inna V. Stonik, Tatiana V. Morozova and Olga G. Shevchenko. Harmful algal blooms on the eastern coast of Russia. .....................................................................................47 Section II. Eastern North Pacific Canada F.J.R. “Max” Taylor and Paul J. Harrison. Harmful marine algal blooms in western Canada........................................................................................................77 United States of America Vera L. Trainer. Harmful algal blooms on the U.S. west coast. ..............................89 Mexico Jose L. Ochoa, S. Lluch-Cota, B.O. Arredondo-Vega, E. Nuñes-Vázquez, A. Heredia-Tapia, J. Pérez-Linares and R. Alonso-Rodriguez. Marine Biotoxins and harmful algal blooms in Mexico’s Pacific littoral..............................119 Summary and conclusions.........................................................................................................129 Appendices A. Members of the Working Group............................................................................................137 B. Original terms of reference (Vladivostok, 1999)..................................................................141 C. Annual reports of WG 15.......................................................................................................143 D. Workshop report on taxonomy and identification of HAB species and data management...149 Foreword This publication by PICES Working Group 15 brings together reviews of the state of knowledge of harmful algal blooms (HABs) in the six PICES member countries of the North Pacific (Canada, Japan, People’s Republic of China, the Republic of Korea, Russia and the United States of America) plus Mexico, up to 2001. Both HABs harming humans due to the consumption of contaminated marine products and those harming marine life are involved; both have major economic and social impacts. The reports summarize the impacts and provide insights into the understanding of the ecology of HABs in northern Pacific countries. All nations report severe HAB problems, often due to the same species of algae. These problems appear to be chronic in some countries, and worsening in others; the severity of HABs will likely continue into the foreseeable future. The need and potential value of co-operation in this and other similarly-affected regions is emphasized in this report. 1 2 Background and objectives This report constitutes the first publication of activities of WG 15 are summarized in 2000-2001 PICES Working Group 15 (WG 15) on Ecology of Annual reports (Appendix C) and in Workshop harmful algal blooms (HABs) in the North Pacific. report on Taxonomy and identification of HAB PICES, the intergovernmental North Pacific species and data management (Appendix D). Marine Science Organization, derives its nickname from “Pacific ICES”, the 10-year-old North This is the first group to establish linkages among Pacific counterpart to the 100 year-old ICES HAB studies in the six PICES member countries (International Council for the Exploration of the but it is not the first Pacific-based international Sea) in the North Atlantic. The current member organization to investigate HABs. In Southeast countries of PICES are Canada, Japan, People’s Asia, a HAB component was a significant part of a Republic of China, Republic of Korea, Russia and seven-year Cooperative Program in Marine the United States. Science, a project sponsored by ASEAN-Canada. The program included within-country training HAB is the internationally preferred collective workshops for all the ASEAN countries: Malaysia name for harmful phenomena, also known (including Sabah and Sarawak), Indonesia, Brunei, variously as “red tides”, “brown tides”, and by the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam similar names which may, confusingly, include (which joined shortly before the program harmless blooms or blooms without visible concluded). A communication network, based in manifestations. They have freshwater counterparts the Philippines, was left in place after the program but only the marine forms are considered here. ended. WESTPAC, another regional scientific The subjects harmed by HABs are either humans organization under IOC, has sponsored meetings or marine fauna. WG 15 was formed as an and training courses on HABs in the western initiative of both the Marine Environmental Pacific, and DANIDA and APEC have also Quality (MEQ) and Biological Oceanography focused on Pacific HABs mostly in Southeast (BIO) Committees at the Eighth Annual Meeting Asia. IOC has a semi-permanent office dealing of PICES in Vladivostok in 1998. It was with global HABs that is located in Denmark. established in recognition of dramatically Most recently IOC-UNESCO has established an increasing reports of HABs, not only in the North international program concerned with promoting Pacific but also in the coastal regions of the world the study of the ecology of HABs on a global as a whole. Its goals are to promote the exchange scale, termed GEOHAB. At present most of the of information and cooperation between the activity has been at the national level, most PICES member countries to assist in coping with notably ECOHAB in the United States, but with HABs. A similar working group has been in national programs formed or forming in several existence under various guises in ICES for more other PICES member countries. than a decade, the North Atlantic being similarly afflicted with various types of HABs, including Our goal in preparing this report has been to most of those mentioned here. provide a useful and practical guide to HAB- related problems, literature and related The membership and terms of reference for research/monitoring efforts in northern Pacific WG 15 are shown in Appendices A and B. As a nations. For example, the literature relating to first priority, the Working Group agreed that the each country deliberately includes obscure local state of knowledge on HABs and their impacts in literature that might otherwise be missed by each of the member countries needed to be outsiders. The national reports provide a basis for reviewed to serve as a baseline for determination future annual incident updates similar to those of of regional needs. Other goals were to encourage the ICES working group. The activities of WG 15 regional communications, collaborative studies, have also brought to light discrepancies in standardization of methodologies, data sharing approach and methodologies in the reporting and and, possibly, training initiatives. The interim study of HAB data by the member countries (see 3 Summary and conclusions). Although there are coastlines such as Canada, Russia or the United some differences in detail among PICES member States. countries, this work has emphasized that all PICES countries suffer from common problems and This commonality should help to unite HAB challenges due to HABs. In many ways, HABs researchers in PICES nations in the future, have created a bridge of understanding among motivating many international collaborative efforts nations that share bodies of water and coastlines. that strive to better understand the ecology and These nations are, in fact, more similar to one oceanography of North Pacific and global HABs. another than a single nation with multi-ocean F.J.R. “Max” Taylor and Vera L. Trainer 4 Section I Western North Pacific 5 6 Red tides and other harmful algal blooms in Japan Yasuwo Fukuyo1, Ichiro Imai2, Masaaki Kodama3 and Kyoichi Tamai4 1 Asian Natural Environmental Science Center, the University of Tokyo, Yayoi 1-1-1, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, Japan 113-8657. E-mail: [email protected] 2 Graduate School of Agriculture, Kyoto University, Oiwake-cho, Kitashirakawa, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, Japan 606-8502. E-mail: [email protected] 3 School of Fisheries Sciences, Kitasato University, Okiraiazautou 160-4, Sanriku-cho, Kesen-gun, Iwate, Japan 022-0101. E-mail: [email protected] 4 National Research Institute of Fisheries and Environment of Inland Sea, Fisheries Research Agency, Maruishi 2-17-5, Ohno-cho, Saeki-gun, Hiroshima, Japan 739-0452. E-mail: [email protected] History of HAB investigations in Japan species such as Chattonella, Gymnodinium