Finding Seagrass: The

- ie swimming peacefully along the coast... you feel
something soft and slimy brush against your legs. Is it
the cold embrace of a floating corpse? No, it’s seagrass!
But what the hell is seagrass?

Seagrass, although commonly thought to be seaweed
isn’t - it’s an actual plant that lives underwater.

Seagrasses don’t grow individually, they grow togeth-
er into lush groupings called meadows. Seagrass is
descended from plants that decided that land wasn’t all
it cracked up to be, so they went back into the ocean,
where they could really get on with the business of
being plants. Seagrass actually reproduces sexually,
with pollen and flowers, only kinkier, since it’s under-
water.

There are over 60 species of seagrass in the world,
found everywhere from Vancouver Island to the coasts
of Israel, Australia, Florida and the Philippines.
Although seagrass can be a little slimy when you touch
it, you may not have to worry about that for too much

longer, seeing as it’s going extinct.

Seagrass has never been seen as what some would.
call an exotic area of scientific study, and until recent-
ly no large scale surveys of it had never been con-
ducted. There were some educated guesses about

where it grew, and how much there was - 600,000

square kilometers worldwide, according to one
study in 1998, but it was anyone’s guess for an
exact number.

| ws ntil now. The United Nations Environment
Program (or UNEP for the initiated) just con-
ducted a survey of seagrasses. The news is
bad. Worldwide, there is only 177,000

less than one third of previous estimates,
and in the last ten years, 15% of seagrasses
have been permanently lost. If the current
rate of destruction keeps up, by the time
our grandchildren are around, there may
not be any left at all.
So why-should you care? Well; sea-
grasses don’t just hang
around looking slimy.

They have all sorts of fantastic benefits to man, like
wave attenuation, shoreline and sediment stabilization,
and they help trap carbon dioxide which helps with a
little something environmentalists like to call global
warming. ;

S eagrasses are also what some people (well, me and

UNEP) like to call the ‘forgotten marine ecosystem’.
Many, many more people know (and care) about fancy,
pretty places like coral reefs and mangrove swamps, but
don’t know (or care) about seagrass meadows. While
they may not be as glamorous as those other marine
ecosystems, seagrass meadows are just as important.

Seagrass meadows provide habitat and food for hun-
dreds of different forms of life, some of which, like the
manatee and the green turtle are endangered. They also
form part of the food web for larger species-like shore-
birds and dolphins, as well as some less interesting
things like mollusks, insects, and fish. Many commer-
cially important fish species use seagrass meadows as a
nursery area - they use the lush and protective meadows
as a place to grow bigger before venturing out into the
open ocean. Then we eat them.

The really interesting thing about seagrass meadows
is that they produce lots of food, and then they export
over 25% percent of that to other marine ecosystems,
like coral reefs and mangrove swamps.. That means that
if seagrass is destroyed it has a direct impact on other
threatened ecosystems... thus, seagrass isn’t really just a-
local problem, its destruction has long and far ranging
effects.

square kilometers of seagrass left. That's

o what exactly is destroying all the seagrass in the
world? Well, in one word - development.

Seagrass lives in shallow coastal waters, and can grow
at varying depths, depending on how clear the water is,
because seagrass needs at least 30% light penetration to
be able to grow. What this means that whenever coastal
waters become clouded, dirty or polluted it directly
impacts seagrass. Need some examples?

-Fhere were some educated
guesses about where seagrass
grew, and how much there was -
600,000 square kilometers
worldwide, according to one
study in 1998, but it was any-
one’s guess for an exact
number.