Lessons learned from over thirty years of eelgrass restoration on the US West Coast

Ward, Melissa; Beheshti, Kathryn

doi:10.1002/ecs2.4642

Cited by 4 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 63 publications

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“…Transplanting and restoring seagrass beds is notably difficult, and quantification of seagrass transplant performance is far more nuanced and complex than simply considering total survival as the sole metric for success. Contextualizing, in a meta-analysis of 82 seagrass restoration projects on the West Coast of the U.S., 32 -60% of projects were unsuccessful (Ward and Beheshti, 2023), yet 'unsuccessful' projects certainly can still contribute to advancing methods in restoration science (Zhang et al, 2021). As such, other metrics beyond survivorship (i.e., ecosystem services) should also be considered in the evaluation of transplant success (Ward and Beheshti, 2023).…”

Section: Evaluation Of Transplant Successmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Contextualizing, in a meta-analysis of 82 seagrass restoration projects on the West Coast of the U.S., 32 -60% of projects were unsuccessful (Ward and Beheshti, 2023), yet 'unsuccessful' projects certainly can still contribute to advancing methods in restoration science (Zhang et al, 2021). As such, other metrics beyond survivorship (i.e., ecosystem services) should also be considered in the evaluation of transplant success (Ward and Beheshti, 2023).…”

Section: Evaluation Of Transplant Successmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The biophysical characterizations reveal a more compelling and consistent case for deleterious site conditions, as a mosaic of unsuitable environmental conditions occurred at transplant sites. And while biologic controls are undoubtably important to seagrass systems, regionally along the West Coast of the USA, physical drivers are principally responsible for eelgrass transplant success or decline (Ward and Beheshti, 2023). Yet surprisingly, many Zostera spp.…”

Section: Causative Factors Of Transplant Mortalitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As such, restoration efforts to alleviate the loss of Zostera spp. habitat have been ongoing for nearly 50 years (Phillips, 1964), and in the SCB, for more than 30 years (Ward and Beheshti, 2023). These compensatory mitigations and active restoration projects have remained relatively small and have utilized a multitude of transplant techniques, including single shoot, bundle shoot, transplant frames (TERFS), among others, and each project resulted in varying degrees of project success (Williams, 2001;Altstatt, 2003;Ward and Beheshti, 2023).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Open coast seagrass habitats, especially on the West Coast of the U.S., are plagued by inconsistent, outdated, or entirely absent data; congruent with the challenges highlighted by global assessments seeking to gauge seagrass coverage more accurately (McKenzie et al, 2020). To date, nearly all seagrass restoration projects in the SCB have focused on Z. marina following impacts from coastal development projects occurring in depths from 1 to ~6 m in protected bays, lagoons, and estuaries (Altstatt, 2003;and e.g., Hoffman, 1986;Pondella et al, 2006;Merkel & Associates, Inc, 2010;Obaza et al, 2015;MBC Applied Environmental, 2016), a disparity evidenced in a meta-analysis that identified 43 out of 44 transplant projects occurring in the SCB from 1989 to 2020 focused on Z. marina in protected embayments and estuaries (Ward and Beheshti, 2023).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Wave, light, and dissolved oxygen exposures drive novel coastal eelgrass (Zostera pacifica) transplant performance

Sanders,

Obaza,

Grime

et al. 2024

Front. Mar. Sci.

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The high ecological and economic value of seagrass has been long recognized, with these foundational habitats providing myriad ecosystem services. Yet through cumulative anthropogenic impacts, seagrasses are exhibiting extensive declines globally. A litany of studies and active restoration trials have demonstrated practical methodologies to restore seagrass habitats and effectively return critical habitat functions to degraded coastal zone systems worldwide. Seagrass loss along the U.S. West Coast has precipitated decades of seagrass protection, conservation, and restoration efforts. Yet, mitigation transplanting efforts have prioritized Zostera marina (narrow-leaved eelgrass) in shallow, protected environments, while a dearth of information is available on species inhabiting offshore islands and exposed mainland coasts. In this study, we conducted a novel transplant of Zostera pacifica, a wide-leaved species found in depths of 7 – 20 m along the offshore islands and mainland coast of California. Transplants were conducted at three geographically distinct sites in Santa Monica Bay, coupled with continuous monitoring of biophysical parameters providing insight into physical drivers at transplant and donor sites. Utilizing in situ data, and environmental thresholds adapted from the literature for Z. marina, we performed exposure analyses to evaluate factors influencing Z. pacifica transplant performance. Exceedances of threshold values for environmental parameters, specifically, wave exposure and near-bed flow speeds (Hrms > 0.59 m and Urms > 0.1 m s-1), photosynthetically active radiation (< 3 and > 5 mol m-2 day-1) and dissolved oxygen (< 3 mg O2 L-1) exposure impacted transplant survivorship. These results suggest Z. pacifica persist in biophysically dynamic conditions and are sensitive to exceedances of thresholds, underlining the importance of pre-transplant site-selection processes to this species. These data represent the first holistic study of Z. pacifica transplanting on an exposed mainland coast, which provides a view into the baseline environmental envelopes within existing Z. pacifica habitat, and further, may serve as a model for investigating scalable open coast seagrass restoration for temperate regions.

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Section: Evaluation Of Transplant Successmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Evaluation Of Transplant Successmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Causative Factors Of Transplant Mortalitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Wave, light, and dissolved oxygen exposures drive novel coastal eelgrass (Zostera pacifica) transplant performance

Sanders,

Obaza,

Grime

et al. 2024

Front. Mar. Sci.

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Restoring blue carbon ecosystems

Friess,

Shribman,

Stankovic

et al. 2024

Camb. prisms Coast. futures

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Mangroves, tidal marshes and seagrasses have experienced extensive historical reduction in extent due to direct and indirect effects of anthropogenic land use change. Habitat loss has contributed carbon emissions and led to foregone opportunities for carbon sequestration, which are disproportionately large due to high ‘blue carbon’ stocks and sequestration rates in these coastal ecosystems. As such, there has been a rapid increase in interest in using coastal habitat restoration as a climate change mitigation tool. This review shows that restoration efforts are able to substantially increase blue carbon stocks, while also having a positive impact on various gaseous fluxes. However, blue carbon increases are spatially variable, due to biophysical factors such as climate and geomorphic setting. While there are potentially hundreds of thousands of hectares of land that may be biophysically suitable for restoration, these activities are still often conducted at small scales and with mixed success. Maximizing potential carbon gains through blue carbon restoration will require managers and coastal planners to overcome the myriad socioeconomic and governance constraints related to land tenure, legislation, target setting and cost, which often push restoration projects into locations that are biophysically unsuitable for plant colonization.

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Taking the Pulse of Resilience in Conserving Seagrass Meadows

Graham,

Harvell,

Christiaen

et al. 2024

Integrative and Comparative Biology

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Foundational habitats such as seagrasses and coral reefs are at severe risk globally from climate warming. Infectious disease associated with warming events is both a cause of decline and an indicator of stress in both habitats. Since new approaches are needed to detect refugia and design climate-smart networks of marine protected areas, we test the hypothesis that the health of eelgrass (Zostera marina) in temperate ecosystems can serve as a proxy indicative of higher resilience and help pinpoint refugia. Eelgrass meadows worldwide are at-risk from environmental stressors, including climate warming and disease. Disease outbreaks of Labyrinthula zosterae are associated with recent, widespread declines in eelgrass meadows throughout the San Juan Islands, Washington, USA. Machine language learning, drone surveys, and molecular diagnostics reveal climate impacts on seagrass wasting disease prevalence (proportion of infected individuals) and severity (proportion infected leaf area) from San Diego, California to Alaska. Given that warmer temperatures favor many pathogens such as L. zosterae, we hypothesize that absent or low disease severity in meadows could indicate eelgrass resilience to climate and pathogenic stressors. Regional surveys showed the San Juan Islands as a hotspot for both high disease prevalence and severity, and surveys throughout the Northeast Pacific indicated higher prevalence and severity in intertidal, rather than subtidal, meadows. Further, among sites with eelgrass declines, losses were more pronounced at sites with shallower eelgrass meadows. We suggest deeper meadows with the lowest disease severity will be refuges from future warming and pathogenic stressors in the Northeast Pacific. Disease monitoring may be a useful conservation approach for marine foundation species, as low or absent disease severity can pinpoint resilient refugia that should be prioritized for future conservation efforts. Even in declining or at-risk habitats, disease surveys can help identify meadows that may contain especially resilient individuals for future restoration efforts. Our approach of using disease as a pulse-point for eelgrass resilience to multiple stressors could be applied to other habitats such as coral reefs to inform conservation and management decisions.

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Lessons learned from over thirty years of eelgrass restoration on the US West Coast

Cited by 4 publications

References 63 publications

Wave, light, and dissolved oxygen exposures drive novel coastal eelgrass (Zostera pacifica) transplant performance

Wave, light, and dissolved oxygen exposures drive novel coastal eelgrass (Zostera pacifica) transplant performance

Restoring blue carbon ecosystems

Taking the Pulse of Resilience in Conserving Seagrass Meadows

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