"DIDYMO"- BROWN "Snot" Taking Over World's
Rivers
It began with a few small strange patches of slime, clinging to the rocks
of the Heber River in Canada. Within a year, the patches had become thick,
blooming mats. Within a few years the mats had grown into a giant
brownish-yellow snot. And within a few decades this snot had spread
around the world, clogging up rivers as far away as South America,
Europe and Australasia. This snot, which is still
flourishing today, is caused by a microscopic alga, a diatom that goes by its
scientific name Didymosphenia
geminata. It has become so notorious it has its own moniker,
Didymo. But underlying the snots’ strange appearance is an even stranger
story. About Didymo itself, about what it is, and how it
behaves.
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