DESTIN, FL - Just in time for tourist season, June grass has returned to local waters. The feathery algae blooms in warm water and is common in the Gulf of Mexico during the summer months.
   
It has been spotted in waters off Walton, Okaloosa and Santa Rosa counties since the beginning of the month.
   
"There's a lot of it," said John Pearman, who works at the Okaloosa Island Fishing Pier. "All the southwest winds got it hemmed up."
   
June grass does plenty to annoy beachgoers and fishermen. It creeps into bathing suits and clogs up fishing line. But it also serves an important ecological need, pointed out Dave Urie, who helps run the pier.
   
"Remember, it's a nursery for all the little fish," he said. "The momma fish lay their eggs in it. It protects the little fish from the medium-size fish so they can grow up."
   
It also provides nutrients when it washes up on the beach, Urie said.
   
This year's bloom isn't as thick as in previous years. In 2006, so much June grass washed in that it piled on the beach, drying in craggy peaks. Bulldozers were brought in to clear the beach that year.
   
Pearman said the fish still are biting in the afternoon, despite the June grass.
   
"It ain't that big globby crap just coating the whole coast," he said, referring to sargassum, another weed that frequents local beaches.
   
"But it's here, and I'm looking at it. If you threw a cast net, you'd be sorry. It would be full of grass."