SARASOTA COUNTY – Red tide has hit hard this summer on the Suncoast causing businesses to shut down and make visitors think twice about coming here. Now red tide has weakened its grip on the gulf waters.


Siesta Key Beach which normally is packed on a Friday only had some remnants of people on the beach.


As the red tide has diminished quite a bit we spoke to some tourists to get their take.


“My twin sister and I decided to come down for our birthday, and we kind of made plans ahead of time. We heard about the red tide we’re really not big swimmers, so walking along the beach is good for us,” said Sharon Weiss.


“It wouldn’t have impacted this trip because it was just between my sister and I going to the beach going to enjoy the hot weather really so the beach was just a bonus so we enjoyed the beach walking along and the smell was little strong at times but really even too bad,” said Karen Weiss.


“It definitely impacted our stay. We actually drove up to Clearwater because we actually wanted to go into the water. But we just came down here the beach is still nice. It’s still a beautiful place but to go into the water we won’t go into the water down here. There is a few dead fish but and the smell is a little off. But other than that it’s still beautiful,” said Sean Borg.


“Obviously you can’t predict it but I really wish I could have enjoyed the clear waters like everybody says and it’s dirty,” said Kari Ernst.


“We went to Clearwater and this one. Clearwater the water was still nice and this one you can kind of see the red tide coming in and everything there’s a couple dead fish so we didn’t go in the water here but the beach is still nice,” said Keanu Quinonez.


The tourists all agree they would have not come down here a month ago when the red tide was at it’s peak.