Creating new oyster habitat in Sarasota Bay
The waters of Sarasota Bay are home to a bountiful natural and cultural heritage that define our sense of place. A sense of place is the culture, heritage and diversity of a region. It is finding inspiration in the past, creating meaning for the present and planning for the future. CREDIT: Pete Carmichael
DR. JAY LEVERONE
Guest Writer
news@lbknews.com
This summer, the Sarasota Bay Estuary Program (SBEP) is creating two new oyster habitats within the bay. The SBEP is increasing the footprint of an oyster habitat that was built in 2005 at White Beach in Little Sarasota Bay and the construction of a new habitat at the Gladiola Fields along the eastern shore in Manatee County.
White Beach is in a highly urbanized setting that historically supported oyster beds, but shoreline alterations and residential development have since destroyed them. The Gladiola Fields site lies adjacent to agricultural lands that border the bay. This project builds on the success of an earlier pilot project, which showed that prospective Sarasota Bay oyster habitats are substrate limited. This means oysters will not recover without suitable and sufficient substrate material for oysters to attach and grow.
The SBEP designed the habitats to replicate the structure of existing oyster habitat by utilizing fossilized shell to create the structural component of each habitat. Once completed, there will be five, 50-foot diameter habitats built at each site. Each habitat will contain a perimeter of bagged fossil shell to prevent the shell from dispersing, while the interior will consist of a six-foot-one-inch layer of loose shell. The fossil shell will be colonized by natural oyster larvae, or spat, which is available from nearby natural oyster beds. This restoration technique is readily transferable to other Florida estuaries that may lack sufficient substrate.
The habitats will be monitored for two years after they are constructed. How the habitats are functioning will be assessed by measuring growth and survival of spat (recruits to the shell) and habitat use by fish and invertebrates.
These habitat creation projects are important and valuable to the local estuarine ecology and integral to the overall habitat restoration. Sarasota Bay is an estuary of national significance, Outstanding Florida Water, and a Florida priority estuarine conservation area as part of the Fish and Wildlife Conservation.
Dr. Jay Leverone is a senior scientist for the Sarasota Bay Estuary Program.
Economic value of estuaries
CAROLINE McKEON
Guest Writer
news@lbknews.com
Estuaries are places where freshwater mixes with salty water from the sea. Teeming with life, the nation’s estuaries provide vital habitats for 80 percent of the world’s fish and shellfish species, including many that are listed as threatened or endangered. Estuaries are one of the nation’s most valuable natural resources, creating more food per acre than the richest farmland.
The significance of the economic value of the nation’s estuaries becomes crystal clear when considering the following statistics, taken from U.S. Senate Resolution 596, designating in 2010 that Sept. 25 is National Estuaries Day:
• The estuary regions of the United States comprise a significant share of the national economy, with 43 percent of the population, 40 percent of the employment and 49 percent of the economic output of the United States.
• Coasts and estuaries contribute more than $800 billion annually in trade and commerce to the U.S. economy.
• 43 percent of all adults in the United States visit a seacoast or estuary at least once a year to participate in some form of recreation, generating $8 billion to $12 billion in revenue annually.
• 28 million jobs in the United States are supported by commercial and recreational fishing, boating, tourism and other coastal industries that rely on healthy estuaries.
• In the past 100 years, 55 million acres of estuarine habitat have been destroyed. Bays once filled with fish and oysters have become dead zones filled with excess nutrients, chemical wastes, harmful algae and marine debris. Sea level rise is accelerating the degradation of estuaries by submerging low-lying land, eroding beaches, converting wetland to open water, exacerbating coastal flooding and increasing the salinity of estuaries and freshwater aquifers.
• Estuaries provide critical ecosystem services, also known as ‘Natural Capital,’ that protect human health and public safety, including water filtration, flood control, shoreline stabilization and erosion prevention, the protection of coastal communities during extreme weather events, climate stabilization and maintenance of soil fertility. Over-harvesting or direct forms of manipulation (paving, soil erosion, seawalls, etc.) that deplete Natural Capital have resulted in degraded ecosystem services. Natural Capital must be quantified and understood in its economic dimensions to avoid its destruction by markets that underestimate its value.
“The health of Sarasota Bay is inextricably linked to the economic vitality and quality of life experienced in Sarasota and Manatee counties. To truly comprehend that impact to our community in economic terms, Manatee and Sarasota need to quantify the revenue generated in the local economy from jobs, recreational activities, ecotourism and other coastal industries that rely on a healthy estuary. Only then will people fully appreciate Sarasota Bay as a primary economic engine of the region and as the most important natural asset,” according to “Sarasota Bay: Celebrating Our Water Heritage.”
Caroline McKeon is the editor of the Sarasota Bay Estuary Program newsletter and is the president and executive producer of Florida Journeys Communications.
