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Dennis did a good job of quoting myself and Dr. Heck. I like reporters that don't mess with your words.
If you ever get a chance to snorkel the Seagrasses down in Perdido Bay, do it. Amazing the amount of juvenile fish in them. And the ones in MS Sound are loaded with juvenile lane snapper.
Article is too long to post, so here is the link:
http://www.al.com/news/beaches/index.ssf/2015/02/seagrass_isnt_sexy_but_nurseri.html
Good and informative article. Thanks.
Good article and it answers some of the questions I ask myself when fishing the Navy Cove and surrounding areas last October. Having learned many years ago in the Indian River at Titusville Florida, that one of the best places to catch specs in that area was on the edges of grass beds. Therefore while fishing in Mobile Bay I was looking for similar habitat but found very little to none. Thanks for the info Carl.
Really nice article. Thanks Carl.
Big Dawg,
The grassbeds in Mobile Bay proper are all up on the northern end, south of the causeway and north of it along the river banks.
Navy Cove, Bon Secour Bay and the north side of the Fort Morgan peninsula has never had much more than spotty beds here & there that didn't last. Even historical records don't show much if anything. Not sure why???
How much do you think shrimp trawling has affected the grass beds?
A fine article and awesome work there Carl!
If it would aid your research (or just for old times sake ;-) I would gladly recollect my early lifetime experiences with seagrass beds near our family house just south of Mullet Point.
It would seem another contributing factor in the degradation of water quality (clarity) in the upper half of Mobile Bay (not mentioned in the article) was the extensive dead (clam and oyster) shell dredging operations undertaken by Radcliff Materials through the 1960s and 70s.
http://library.disl.org:8080/FullDis...2529%26ST0%3DH
http://www.gulfshorespierfishing.com...tid=3353&stc=1
It is unfortunate (even now) about all that remains of grassbeds along the eastern and western shores of Mobile Bay is the historical catalogs of aerial photography along with anecdotal reports.
I wish your research and restoration projects great success for the continued health and well being not only of the estuary system itself, but for the benefit of residents and guests around it!
Thank you!!!
Perhaps the 'beat down' those areas take from the longer fetch winter winds?Quote:
Originally Posted by CarlF
IF the habitat (bottom composition) is acceptable to seagrasses maybe a protective barrier like the "living reefs" could help establish quieter waters for them to take hold?
Enough so that CCA pushed the AL-MR to redefine the shrimping area boundaries in upper Mobile Bay.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave
http://media.al.com/live/photo/shrim...15d5_large.jpg
But deeper water shrimping operations probably wouldn't have much direct effect on seagrass beds because they mostly grow in relatively shallow water.
However, as the article mentioned, ordinary boat traffic has quite a detrimental impact on grassbeds
http://imgick.al.com/home/bama-media...71faf6fe05.JPG
I think it has had very little impact. Currently just about all areas with grassbeds are off limits to any trawling.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave
And its normally very shallow water: 1-4' of water at high tide.
And if you trawl a grass bed it simply fills your net with grass and tons of stuff you cant keep, so shrimpers would avoid them anyway.
Pier#r, in regards to the shell dredger impacts, that seems to be the consensus but no clear evidence of what the cause was. Same with the losses along the western shore.
And I think you are correct about the fetch along Fort Morgan/Bon Secour, but once again, no clear evidence of that.
A big concern to me is that areas that had grass back prior to 2004-05 up in the Delta have not recovered. Grand Bay, Chuckfee, lower Bay Minette, McRenolds Lake/The Basin all lost hundreds if not thousands of acres of grass and it has not recovered. No real clear reason why. We hope to address some of that if we get the funds.
Good news is that acreage in lower Perdido has been on the increase for years, more there since anytime since the 1940's. And some of those beds are deep, 5-7' of water.