Babies into the new year…

I’m happy to report that we still have a good number of our babies. Fortunately, through the Christmas break, Kim, Mikey and I were able to share the feeding responsibilities. I’m “on” all this week. Special thanks to Mike Patricio who has stepped in to feed when needed. Mikey has also provided the lab space, live algae and air we need to hatch and raise our brine shrimp. Soon we will be moving into our own small space so that Mikey can get to conditioning shellfish for the upcoming spawn.

At this point we have approximately 40 healthy looking guys “happily” swimming around and hunting for food. We are losing one every other day or so for no apparent reason. The ones that die look just as healthy as their living brothers and sisters still swimming. I no longer see any trapped on the surface suffering from air trapped in there pouches or some similar malady. Many now gather near the bottom of the tank seaming to be looking at their reflection in the glass or just hunting for food down there.

I would like to think that we can begin to supplement with some non-live food such as chopped glass shrimp, but I’m a little concerned about fouling the water in the tank. I may try later this week to see what happens. If we do augment the feeding this way we will surely have to up the water change schedule. Another concern is that we want to keep these guys accustomed to hunting for food if we have any chance of successfully releasing them when they get large enough.

Oh yeah, our pregnant male looks about ready to pop any day now…

-ChrisP

Blondes have more fun?

I reported last week on our latest batch of seahorse babies and the fact that we had one light colored individual in the bunch. The next day I looked in the tank and I saw 2, but I thought miscounted. Well now its almost a week later and we have 5!

I’m not exactly sure what is happening, but we seem to be gaining blondes somehow. Three of the 5 are almost yellow while another has some dark highlights on a light background and another is a more brownish blonde. All of these light “guys” stand in stark contrast to the nearly jet black coloring of the other babies.

I knew the adults changed color in response to mood and activity, but I didn’t know that the babies changed color as they matured. Learn something new every day…

At this point we have about 30 individuals of various sizes with some really large ones in the dark group. The blondes appear to be among the most active so hopefully they will make it through to adulthood.

We’re looking to begin to feed some chopped shrimp and other “meat” soon to get these guys growing even faster.

I will report on how they do.

Merry Christmas!

-ChrisP

NYC plantings postponed until January…

Some of you may be aware of our efforts to plant eelgrass in Jamaica Bay NYC. It’s a long story, but we are working with NYCDEP and the Gateway Jamaica Bay Unit among others to establish test plantings at three locations near the mouth of the Bay. There was interest in us planting further inside Jamaica, but water quality, temperature and sediment texture appear to be limiting factors here.

After some discussion, we secured permits from both the NYSDEC, Region 2 and Parks to do the plantings earlier this year and we have been looking to schedule plantings for this fall/winter. This pilot planting will hopefully lead the way for a large-scale effort to be funded by NYCDEP…

Although I had hoped to get our plants in by now uncooperative weather and several scheduling conflicts have pushed this work into late January. This late date does not affect the plants as much as it affects the divers. We are fine to plant right through the winter but the water is not very warm as you might imagine.

I will report here when we complete the plantings…

Just be thankful its not you out there diving!

-ChrisP

Web Page Improvements...

While I was gone Kim also was able to make some changes and update the web page. Take a look at the modified layout and new links on the bottom and let us know what you think. More changes will come this winter, but we try and get things accomplished as time allows.

With the "What's New" button visitors will be able to quickly find out what has been added or changed. We also added a link to pictures that we have lent out to others in the "Picture Hall of Fame" link. We are more than happy to provide pics to those who ask...

-ChrisP

The Ponies are Growing!

I’ve been out for a couple weeks now, but just before I left we had another batch of baby seahorses arrive. We’ve been through a few of these events and unfortunately, we have not been able to get these little guys past about 10-14 days. This time is different.

The big difference was the fact that Kim Petersen took the babies home at the end of week one and was able to keep them fed. Past broods have suffered major losses after the first weekend as I was only able to feed them a few times. Also, I was putting too much food in the tank at one time. This time Kim fed them several times each day and got them past what has been a major bottleneck.

I came back to the office today to find about 50 healthy looking, large ponies swimming in a 10 gallon tank. All are jet black except for one “blonde”. Since I didn’t observe this batch closely from the beginning, I don’t know how many were light from the start, but I have seen maybe 10% of the lighter colored individuals in past batches.

There is no guarantee that we will be able to raise these guys to adulthood, but from the looks of it we are on the right track. The fact that they have more than doubled in size and are eating well is a good sign.

For now, I will cross my fingers and hope that we have figured this out.

-ChrisP

The Fall season is in full swing…

Although most people assume that our busiest season is summer they couldn’t be further from the truth. We’re out in the boat a lot during the summer given the great weather, but fall is when most of the real important work takes place. Unfortunately, fickle weather patterns including heavy winds from the northwest keep us in the office more than we would like during this time of year. As a result, we have more work to do than days to do it in and we must take advantage of every field day possible. It is not unusual for me to hold off scheduling meetings until I look at the weather forecast for the week.

Although the fall brings us cold air temps the water takes some time to drop. This change is really tied into colder nights that inch the mercury downward day by day. The opposite is true in the spring when the air gets warmer faster than the water. It’s that whole heat capacity thing that I don’t want to get into now…

One big advantage of working in the fall is that the water clarity (vis) really improves. The algae all seem to take a break for the season and do not bloom. This is less than ideal for our filter feeders like shellfish and perfect for those of us who want to see past our noses while diving. This added light is also critical for the grass as we observe a nice little growth spurt in fall as lateral shoots emerge.

During fall we complete our monitoring for the various test planting sites and we summarize the results of our large-scale restoration projects. If the planting has suffered losses over summer we sometimes observe slight increases in shoot density by November or December. It’s not that the shoots get any larger, actually they get smaller, but what we want to see is more of them. For the some projects we may even replant.

Another advantage of the colder temps is that the crabs slow a little and tend to cause less damage to our plots. Unfortunately, most of the damage has already taken place during the summer, but this is helps to protect our new plantings. This is especially true in January, but this frigid water even slows us down!

This year, we don’t have an overly eventful fall. We just have a few projects to complete before January. Planting sites include Caumsett State Park in Long Island Sound (LIS), Great Gull Island (LIS), Jamaica Bay, NYC and several areas along the north fork. I always like to add at least a couple new test plots and we are still figuring out which ones we will use this year.

Soon we will be breaking out our dry suits. For now I can still dive wet…

-ChrisP

“Donut” anyone?

On a recent dive at the Terry’s Point restoration site, I was surprised to observe very small “bald spots” at the center of the larger patches indicating that we may be observing the initiation of what I call “donuts”. In this case, there is still a dense covering of rhizomes, but there are few if any shoots in this open area leading me to believe that some process may be limiting shoot recruitment here.

At many natural meadows in high energy areas we observe distinct patterns including rings, crescents or C-shaped formations scattered throughout the bed. In fact, this distinctive signature helps us to distinguish grass from macroalgae beds in aerial photos in the Sound and Gardiners Bay. Despite the fact that these forms are common, it is not really clear how and when they form.

I always assumed that these started off as circular patches that eventually lose their centers. In some cases there may be a breach of the ring leading to the formation of a “C” or similar. However, since we have not observed this, I just don’t know if this is the process.

Continued observations at Terry’s may allow us to follow this progression. Overall, the grass here is flourishing and the early summer plantings that Steve, Kim and Ali did this year, adjacent to the large patches are doing REALLY well, so there is no reason to think that the grass is under stress here. In fact, I couldn’t be happier with the project.

Only time will tell whether this is beginning of a natural meadow-shaping process. All we can do is sit back and let nature take its course. In the mean time we will continue to plant shoots in the adjacent rocky areas to ensure that this meadow expands and flourishes. I wish all of our sites were doing so well!

-ChrisP

New Skin for the Nursery!

Steve organized a group of us to replace the plastic on the greenhouse. This was long overdue. We were still on our original covering and I think we put the place up in 2001! Hopefully, with the new plastic we can inflate the roof properly and keep a little more heat in this winter. The first time we installed the plastic it was too tight and we haven’t been able to inflate the roof correctly ever since…

-ChrisP

Seeding for diversity…

Yesterday Kim and I went out to our eastern Long Island Sound (LIS) restoration sites and overseeded with seeds from several donor meadows. We were fortunate to collect a large number of seeds from Fishers Island and Mulford Pt. this year and it is time we got them out of the nursery. We will be planting some for restoration, some for grow out in the creek behind the lab, but a large number were destined to increase the genetic diversity at our existing restoration sites.

Because we created the meadows at St. Thomas and Terry’s Points with adult shoot transplants the genetic diversity in these new meadows is probably low. We make every effort to collect shoots from various locations to ensure the highest diversity, but given that these stable meadows could be single clones there is no guarantee that what we collect is genetically diverse.

In an effort in increase genetic diversity at these sites we overseed with seeds collected from various donor populations in the Sound. We have found through the years working at these high energy sites that seeds do not recruit very effectively in the absence of adult shoots. Apparently, the seeds need the moderating influence of these shoots to reduce currents and turbulence that might otherwise dislodge or overly bury the seeds. In the presence of adult shoots, however, they do recruit and grow.

The seeding at St. Thomas involved spreading the seeds at the leading edge of each large patch of grass that we encountered. There is a “leading edge” because the current always runs in one direction given the shape of the shoreline. This way, as the seeds migrate down current they will have the greatest opportunity to be trapped by the stems and other bottom irregularities. If we placed them near the center of these areas, there is a greater chance that the seeds might be transported out of the patches and beyond where they could effectively recruit.

The conditions at Terry’s Pt. are different so I simply sprinkled the seeds throughout the large patches. Other seeds were broadcast outside the patches to see if they could recruit under here.

During our planting we broadcast approximately 500,000 seeds between the two sites. Three quarters of these were planted at St. Thomas site and the balance at Terry’s. Only time will tell how manh of these seeds recruit.

-ChrisP

Little Ram Test Plantings continued…

This week after getting back from giving a talk at the Restore America’s Estuaries Conference in Providence Rhode Island we were able to get a little field work in.

On the top of the agenda was checking on the status of the Little Ram Island plantings off of Shelter Island. In my previous post I reported on the survival of these rock plantings into September, but I was not in the water that day and wanted to see them first hand. I also wanted to add some fall plantings to provide a better overwinter test as late spring/early summer plantings are not the norm for us.

When we arrived at the buoy and anchored we were welcomed by a curious seal that watched as we donned our gear. I was hoping to see our friend in the water, but despite how many times we have seen seals on the surface in the fall and winter, we have never seen one up close in the water. Its probably better off as we are not supposed to “harass” marine mammals regardless of how innocuous it may seem.

Once in the water, it was clear that the buoy had been moved as nothing looked right and no plants could be found. I eventually swam about 100ft. north and was able to find our plots. Once I moved the blocks and buoy over, Kim and I were able to add some additional plantings and check on the status of those from spring. Ali was on the boat for support.

I must say that I was not overly impressed with what was there (See above photo). It looked like we might have lost a few since September, which would be odd as we usually lose things in July and August, but again I wasn’t in the water last time so I’m not a good judge of what was there.

What is clear is that we added a few hundred more plants to the area to give it a better chance of overwintering and spreading. One thing we will have to watch out for is the growth of the Sargassum. There was absolutely no sign of this species in the spring and now it carpets the rocks we planted under. Surrounding rocks actually have a heavy growth of much taller Sargassum. I don’t think it will be a problem if the eelgrass can keep up, but we will have to watch. Never a dull moment…

I am scheduled to meet with the folks form Shelter Island to discuss future plans for this site, Cornelius Point and Coecles Harbor the first week in November. I am hoping that they will look favorably on our efforts on the Island and allow us to continue.

-ChrisP