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Report
Volunteer Science Seagrass Monitoring Report 2024
Center for Environmental Diagnostics and Bioremediation, University of West Florida
02/26/2025
Abstract
Seagrass beds provide key ecosystem services in the protected, shallow coastal zone. They are usually characterized by a diverse faunal community and support commercially and recreationally important fish and shellfish species (Orth and Heck 2023). These species find refuge, food or nursery areas in these beds which are particularly important for endangered species such as manatees and sea turtles. Carbon fixation by seagrasses, macroalgae or microalgae including epiphytes, benthic microalgae or phytoplankton is a carbon source for higher trophic levels and may be stored in sediments, the “blue carbon” which represents a sink for carbon dioxide (Orth and Heck 2023). Nutrient cycling in seagrass includes recycling, burial of organic material in sediments and the processes of nitrification, denitrification and nitrogen fixation.
Lagoonal systems in the Gulf of Mexico contain extensive seagrass beds. In the Pensacola Bay system, the first estimates of the extent of seagrass beds began in 1974 with Escambia Bay Recovery Report (EPA 1975). Since then, other aerial photographic surveys (Schwenning et al. 2007, Harvey et al. 2015, Byron et al. 2018) and monitoring of seagrass beds in Gulf Islands National Seashore have occurred (Heck and Byron 2014, Byron et al. 2018).
UWF along with Sea Grant Extension agents began this Seagrass monitoring program in 2017. Sea Grant and the Bream Fishermen Association help to identify and train volunteers on how to monitor seagrasses. Two goals of this program are to increase community awareness of the importance of seagrass and SAV habitats and to develop long-term monitoring of seagrasses in the Pensacola Bay system.
We used the same adaptation of the UF “Eyes on Seagrass” protocols as last year in Big Lagoon and Santa Rosa Sound where volunteers go out monthly along a transect (Caffrey et al. 2024). Volunteers collecting in the urban bayous (Bayou Texar) or Pensacola Bay followed protocols described in Caffrey et al. (2023). This report describes results from 2024.
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Details
- Title
- Volunteer Science Seagrass Monitoring Report 2024
- Resource Type
- Report
- Publisher
- Center for Environmental Diagnostics and Bioremediation, University of West Florida; Argo Scholar Commons
- Format
- pdf
- Number of pages
- 17
- Copyright
- Permission granted to the University of West Florida Libraries by the author to digitize and/or display this information for non-profit research and educational purposes. Any reuse of this item in excess of fair use or other copyright exemptions requires the permission of the copyright holder.
- Identifiers
- 99381274212106600
- Academic Unit
- Biology; Center for Environmental Diagnostics and Bioremediation ; Hal Marcus College of Science and Engineering
- Language
- English