Website

https://loxahatcheeriver.org/river/seagrass/

Region(s)

NE

Summary

Loxahatchee River District’s Wildpine Ecological Laboratory staff monitored seagrass every-other-month (bi-monthly) at four sites located within the Loxahatchee River Estuary and at a reference site in the southern Indian River Lagoon. Monitoring was conducted to characterize spatial and temporal variation in seagrass percent cover and canopy height within the Loxahatchee River estuary.

Parameters

Percent cover, Shoot counts/density, and canopy height (average blade length, cm), and biomass. Water quality/clarity measured at each site: Temperature, SpCond., Salinity, DO(%sat), DO(mg/l), pH, Secchi, Turbidity, Chl a, PAR, Light. Methods 2003-2007 used transects with 25x25cm quadrats; post-2007 uses randomized 1m2 quadrat)

Notes

Documents on agency website include reports and results of analyses. Updated data typically available by late October.

Application

Publications

Start

2003

End

Current

Frequency

Bimonthly

Method

Monitoring percent occurrence/cover (total and by species), shoot counts/density, canopy height, biomass. 2003-2007: randomized transects with 25x25cm quadrats. Percent occurrence calculated by dividing the number of 25cm X 25cm quadrats (on the transect) with species presence by the total number of quadrats on the transect. Shoot count and canopy height measurements performed at fixed locations along each transect. 2007-current: haphazardly placed 1x1m quadrats within five pre-selected SAV beds. Percent cover is estimated as percent presence/absence using a 25 grid-cell 1m x 1m quadrat (2007-2020) or a 100 grid-cell 1m x 1m quadrat (2021-present). Shoot density and canopy height calculated as average within the quadrat (i.e., average blade length in cm). Analysis by agency determined that the percent occurrence data was the same for the 2003-2007 (transect based) sampling and the 2007-present sampling (CERP patch-scale randomized design).

Discontinuity

Data Location

https://loxahatcheeriver.org/river/seagrass/ - Seagrass Data: 2003-present

Data Format

Excel spreadsheet

Habitats

Submerged Aquatic Vegetation

SEACAR Citation

Loxahatchee River District; Wildpine Ecological Laboratory. (2023). Loxahatchee River District Bi-Monthly Seagrass Monitoring. Updated 04/16/2024. Distributed by: SEACAR Data Discovery Interface, Office of Resilience and Coastal Protection, Florida Department of Environmental Protection. https://data.florida-seacar.org/programs/details/3017

Alternative Citation

indicates priority attributes