A tackle store owner has received a wave of support after breaking down on television recounting the toll of South Australia’s algae crisis.

Mostyn Brown, 75 wishes to retire but doesn’t want to pass on his business as recreational fishermen avoid the water and his financials turn dire.

His store, Gotcha Fishing Tackle at St Morris in Adelaide’s east, has suffered like many businesses as the algae crisis continues to plague SA coastlines.

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Since March when surfers first began falling sick after riding the waves at Goolwa on the Fleurieu Peninsula, the toxic karenia mikimotoi algae has spread along the coastline to Adelaide and around the other side of the Yorke Peninsula, like Port Broughton — about 250km north of where it was first detected.

The algae bloom — now estimated to be about 4500sqkm in size — has killed thousands of fish and other marine life, with regular reports of rotten carcasses washing up on beaches.

Brown’s own daughter did not know how bad his situation was, only realising it when she watched her father in tears on 7NEWS on Wednesday.

“I didn’t want [her] to worry about me,” he told 7NEWS.

Instead, Kristy created a fundraiser to keep her father’s business going.

The GoFundMe has already raised nearly $4000 in less than 24 hours.

“I’m so proud of these people willing to dip their hands into their pocket,” Brown said.

Brown’s current personal circumstances fall short to successfully apply for the current financial assistance available to affected business owners.

However, the 75-years-old is not willing to retire and pass on a sinking ship to new owners.

“We don’t know how far this algal bloom is going to go for and what it is going to do,” he said.

On Thursday a US scientist invited to South Australia for his algal bloom expertise said that he doesn’t know when the bloom will end.

Don Anderson, a senior scientist at Massachusetts-based research organisation The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, said the current bloom was “significant … but I would not call it exceptional”.

As for ending it, Anderson suggests spreading a clay across the surface of affected areas, which would drag the algae down to the bottom of the ocean and kill it, but said to start small.

“You don’t want to try to cover 100 or 500 square kilometres with this material — no one could expect that would be a prudent action,” he said.

“What makes sense is to try to do it on a small scale, experimental scale, 2000 square metres, learn how it works in this organism, learn what capabilities you need, what logistics you need, and then go from there.”

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he didn’t want to get into the “semantics” of declaring the algae bloom a national disaster.

Albanese visited Adelaide and its coastlines and said the federal government will “provide support as requested”.

He spent time with locals on Kangaroo Island on Wednesday morning before unveiling new financial support to the tune of $6.25 million, describing the algae bloom as “heartbreaking”.

Currently the $10,000 Algal Bloom Small Business Support Grant is a voluntary payment by the South Australian Government to assist parties such as retail stores impacted by the bloom.