Seagrass Conservation in Texas Coastal Waters: Monitoring Design Criteria and Biological Indicators for R-EMAP Region 6 Kelly Fellows 11/26/02

Regional Environmental and Monitoring Assessment Program (R-EMAP) EMAP is a research program to develop the tools necessary to monitor and assess the status and trends of national ecological resources. R-MAP tests the applicability of the EMAP approach Uses smaller geographic scales and shorter time frames.

Environmental Issues in Texas Coastal Waters

Study Sites Red Fish Bay Lower Laguna Madre

Sampling Design Hexagons were created using the Theissen function 60 hexagons total at each site 1 random site generated within each hexagon

What was measured? Physiochemical Parameters Total Suspended Solids/Light Attenuation Nutrients Chlorophyll Drift Algae Seagrass Biomass

…a lot of samples! 900 bags of biomass cores 600 bags of algae 540 water samples for Total Suspended Solids Dissolved Inorganic Nitrogen Chlorophyll physiochemical measurements

Results: Depth and Salinity Depth (cm) Salinity (ppt)

Results: TSS vs Light Attenuation TSS (mg/L) Light Attenuation (m-1)

Results: Chlorophyll

Future Work Create more maps showing kriging of variables. Compare some of the Red Fish Bay data with Lower Laguna Madre.

Acknowledgements Andrea Kopecky and Dr. Kenneth Dunton, University of Texas Marine Science Institute Jon Goodall and Dr. David Maidment