Welcome to Mote's Beach Conditions Report

The Beach Conditions Report™, created by Mote Marine Laboratory in 2006 to provide up-to-date information about red tide impacts on local beaches, expanded April 30, 2010, to include impacts from the oil spill created when the Deepwater Horizon oilrig sank in the Gulf of Mexico on April 22, 2010.

The Beach Conditions Report™ covers 25 beaches along Florida's Gulf Coast from the Panhandle south to Lee County. Reports, provided by specially trained observers, are updated twice daily at 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. 365 days a year. Each report is time stamped so that the public knows when it was last updated.

Reports are provided by lifeguards, parks personnel and beach patrol officers who use PDAs to upload information directly to the web via special interface designed by Mote. Click here for the Reports or to sign up to receive reports about particular beaches via e-mail. You may also call 941-BEACHES to listen to Reports over the phone.

Florida beaches included in the Beach Conditions Report™ are:

• Escambia County: Pensacola Beach
• Okaloosa County: Fort Walton Beach, Henderson Beach State Park and Destin Beach
• Gulf County: St. Joseph Peninsula State Park, both Gulfside and Bayside
• Franklin County: St. George Island State Park, both Bayside and Gulfside
• Pinellas County: Caladesi Island, Fort DeSoto Park
• Manatee County: Manatee Beach, Coquina Beach
• Sarasota County: Lido Key, Siesta Key, Nokomis, Venice North Jetty, Venice Beach, Manasota Beach
• Lee County: Bowditch Point Park, Lynn Hall Beach Park, Lovers Key State Park, Bonita Beach, Tarpon Bay Beach, Lighthouse Point, Newton Park and Little Estero Island/Holiday Inn

The Beach Conditions Report™ already included several types of information:

• Whether dead fish are present and whether there is respiratory irritation among beachgoers
• Water color and wind direction
• Whether and where red drift algae are present
• At beaches with lifeguards, reports on rip currents are also provided.

Now, the Beach Conditions Report™  includes a category called "Gulf Oil Spill Impact" with the possible responses of "none," "in the water" or "on the beach." Adding the new category and receiving information about impacts from those workers stationed at Florida's beaches will allow Mote to gather regular snapshots of what's happening along Florida's coast.

Since the oilrig sank, Mote has received numerous inquiries from the public regarding the oil spill and what will happen in Florida, so it was only natural to find a way to incorporate the information into our beach reporting system, said its creator, Dr. Barbara Kirkpatrick. "We created the Beach Conditions Report in 2006 so that we could provide information that the public needed and wanted concerning red tide," she said. "Over the years, we've continued to add new categories that give the public additional information about our beaches. The potential impacts from this oil spill are quite large, so we thought it important to add this new category as well."

Mote is seeking funding that will allow the Beach Conditions ReportTM to remain in effect past June, when the grants that currently support it are scheduled to end. For information on supporting the Report, please contact Mote's Development Office at 941-388-4441, ext. 509.

The Beach Conditions Report is implemented by Mote’s Environmental Health Program. Project partners include the Florida Department of Health, Sarasota County Lifeguard Operations and others. The information gathered for the Beach Conditions Report is also shared with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which formulates a HAB Bulletin, that predicts the movements of harmful algal blooms. The Beach Conditions Report should help enhance NOAA’s forecast ability.

Beach Conditions Report

More information about red tide

The difference between red tide and red drift algae