NW Region
Resilient Florida Program
Last week, Eddy Bouza, Program Director of the Resilient Florida Program, spoke at the Suwannee River League of Cities in Cross City, FL, during the Demystify Grants workshop organized by the Florida League of Cities. Eddy provided an overview of the grant process, helping local residents understand how to apply and manage their grants effectively. Participants also received informational materials detailing the program and its scoring criteria.
NWFAP
Northwest Florida Aquatic Preserve (NWFAP) staff and volunteers hosted a group of 15 youth through Gulf Coast Diplomacy where they learned about living shorelines, toured our native plant nursery, and propagated 625 Juncus roemarianus. “Established in 2008, the Youth Ambassadors for Community Service (YACS) Program is an exchange program for emerging young leaders from underserved backgrounds across France, including the French Caribbean. It is centered around themes of volunteerism, leadership, and intercultural sensitivity. The program is sponsored by the U.S. Embassy in Paris and is administered by Global Ties Kansas City. A small pool of exceptional young leaders is selected through a competitive application process to visit the United States on a fully funded exchange. During their time in the United States, they will work to develop community-based projects through meetings with professional resources in Pensacola, Florida, to give back to their home countries upon return.”
This week, NWFAP also recovered and re-set the pipe that marks our YSI station out in East Bay, Milton with the help of Gulf Corps. It fell during our datalogger swap resulting in a snorkel recovery mission to set it back in place more securely.
SJBSBP
This weekly success is also acting as a shoutout to Tony Cole, the Buffers operations expert, he stays moving. He is our go to guy for equipment questions, how-to’s, and more. Pictured below is Tony giving some quick 411 to our on-site volunteer Wilma. Also, Tony is at it putting up gates on our newly acquired land!
CPAP
Last week Lena Kury from the Central Panhandle Aquatic Preserves (CPAP) attended the Gulf of Mexico Alliance (GOMA) Seagrass Workplan Workshop in Ocean Springs, MS. She spent two and a half days meeting with other seagrass professionals to learn about seagrasses from across the Gulf Coast and plan for the upcoming 2030 Status and Trends Report. The group discussed the history of the program and the timeline for the S&T Report, as well as the different tiers of data that will be included. One thing that really stuck out to her was a project by the Texas Seagrass Monitoring Program (https://www.texasseagrass.org/). They are attempting to map the root systems of seagrasses using acoustic telemetry! The workshop was held at the University of Southern Mississippi’s Gulf Coast Research Laboratory (GCRL). There were a few walking trails to explore during breaks and a dock on Davis Bayou that overlooks the estuary. The GCRL even has a suspension bridge that goes over the floodplain! Lena had a great time in Ocean Springs learning about seagrasses and how many areas along the Gulf Coast will be incorporated into the next Seagrass S&T Report!
CPAP staff successfully recovered one of their data sondes that had become dislodged sometime during the last month. It normally resides in a tube attached to a dock, but upon arriving at the site, it was apparent that the sonde, housing, and mounting hardware were all missing. Although we did receive some wind and high water, our area didn’t face the worst of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, so we believe that it was dislodged either by a boat or large debris. With help from some local fishermen and the crystal clear waters of St. Joe Bay, the tube with the sonde still inside was found resting nearby on the sandy bottom. We retrieved all equipment for damage assessment and cleaning, and promptly returned the next day to remount the housing and deploy the new sonde. We have yet to review the data to see what kind of unique readings we may get from the storms and if we can piece together when it was dislodged from its normal location.
NE Region
NERRS/NERRA Annual Meeting
From Oct. 20 to 24, 2024, GTM Research Reserve Manager Lia Sansom, Research Coordinator Dr. Nikki Dix, Collaboration Coordinator Kaitlyn Dietz and Lead Biologist Hans Prevost attended the NERRS/NERRA Annual Meeting, in collaboration with NOAA and the National Estuarine Research Reserve Association (NERRA). Held in the Gulf of Maine and hosted by Wells NERR and Great Bay NERR, colleagues within the reserve system discussed budgets, program strategies and long- and short-term plans for the National Estuarine Research Reserve System (NERRS). Outcomes of this meeting included developing strategies to expand Teacher on the Estuary (TOTE) trainings, connect Friends groups for professional development, and designing collaborative research projects across NERRs to monitor plankton for improved understanding of estuary health.
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EstuSCARY Haunted Trail
On Oct. 25 and 26, 2024, GTM Research Reserve staff and Friends of GTM Research Reserve hosted a frighteningly fun EstuSCARY Haunted Trail event. The resource management team, along with reserve staff and volunteers scared and surprised over 250 visitors each night through the South Beach Hammock Trail.
Drift Fencing
Collaboration specialists Shannon Brew and John Dickens assisted reserve rangers Zach Lepera and Sarah Moulton in gathering herpetofaunal inventory around GTM Research Reserve by assembling drift fences. To catch any reptiles or amphibians moving through the area, four long, continuous fence arrays are placed at four locations every quarter. The traps are checked for 10 consecutive days for neonates, immature and adult animals, then recorded (all animals are safely handled and released). This process helps resource managers collect data for species richness and abundance in the reserve.
Collaboration in the Field
Collaboration Specialist Shannon Brew joined GTM NERR (GTM Research Reserve) Biologist Jacob Berna to assist with deploying sediment tiles for his project analyzing soil accretion within marsh and mangrove habitats. Jacob hopes to learn about the different drivers of deposition within the marshes. At the 2025 State of the Reserve, he will present his preliminary findings in a poster.
Conservation Day
On October 26, 2024, the Central Florida Aquatic Preserves (CFAP) hosted a Conservation Day for volunteers from their Eagle Scouts volunteer group. A short animal print identification lesson was presented, as well as an in-field gopher tortoise burrow lesson. A group of eight volunteers helped CFAP clean two RV sites, a parking area, a recreation area and access roads. The volunteer group collected approximately six cubic yards of debris created by Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton as they made impact on the area the previous month. Wekiwa sticker patches were awarded to everyone.
Indian River Lagoon Science Festival 2024
This year’s Indian River Lagoon Science Festival hosted 71 booths from different lagoon organizations/entities, including the Indian River Lagoon Aquatic Preserves (IRLAP) crew. Young guests decorated wooden “Drift Cards” that will be released later this year from specified locations along the IRL (Indian River Lagoon). Citizen scientists’ resighting of these cards will provide some insights into water movement and tidal flow/currents in the IRL and neighboring waters. This is IRLAP’s fourth year participating in this study in partnership with the ANGARI Foundation, supplementing their Drift Card study area centered on the Lake Worth Lagoon to the south.
Big Bend Region
BBSAP
This week, BBSAP assisted FSU’s Marine Turtle Research, Ecology, and Conservation Group by retrieving their acoustic recording instruments from St. Martins Marsh. These instruments have been deployed in areas that have previously been identified to have a high density of seat turtles and significant recreational scallop harvesting activity. Their research uses the soundscape data to quantify boat traffic and noise in these key marine turtle habitats. By identifying areas with high boat traffic, the goal is to pinpoint where turtle-boat interactions, such as vessel strikes, are most likely to occur. Unfortunately, no turtles were spotted, however a stone crab made an appearance when the team pulled in their deployed instruments!
SW Region
Rookery Bay’s Master Naturalist Training Graduates 23 (including four staff members)!
Rookery Bay Research Reserve recently finished up the training for the University of Florida’s Master Naturalist Coastal Module Training designation. For nearly 20 years, Rookery Bay has partnered with the University of Florida to teach the Coastal Module portion of the Florida Master Naturalist Designation. This year the Coastal Module graduated four Rookery Bay NERR staff members as well as 19 other participants interested in learning about Florida’s coastal environment and wildlife. Staff from all Rookery Bay departments led classes about a variety of topics including reptiles and amphibians, marine mammals, saltwater fish, coastal uplands, invertebrates, coastal fresh water and more.
Thank you to the staff members who taught sessions – Sarah Falkowski, Kennedy Hanson, Jess Hedgepeth, Marissa Figueroa, Jared Franklin, Donna Young and intern Maitreya Suchocki. Also, a big thank you to Rookery Bay partners for helping lead classes – Mike Sipos, Florida Sea Grant; Megan Hatten, Audubon Florida and Col Lauzau, Audubon Florida.
Ideas Flow at the Rookery Bay Coastal Training Team’s Book Club
Rookery Bay’s Coastal Training Program (CTP) just concluded a second book in their professional development book club. This time they read “Learn Better” by Ulrich Boser. The book helped the group understand how different people learn. They used discussion times to incorporates ideas gained into upcoming CTP programs. It was a win, win, win … for themselves, their department and future CTP projects. Great job team!
Florida Aquarium’s Day of Action at Tampa Bay AP
Volunteers from the Florida Aquarium Staff, as part of their “Day of Action” program, joined TBAP to begin the process of cleaning up islands affected by recent hurricanes. This first island they addressed is one of the most visited islands in Clearwater Harbor - Pinellas County Aquatic Preserve. It has an interpretive trail to teach visitors about the importance of native island plants. Volunteers began redoing the trail. They recovered a displaced picnic table, cleaned up debris and cut up downed trees. Nearly the entire island had been washed over by storm surge. The Florida Aquarium typically sends several groups of staff volunteers per year to help TBAP in the field. A big thank you for this much needed help after the storm!
Estero Bay AP Swap Water Quality Datasondes and Check Stats from Hurricane Milton
This week, Estero Bay AP staff retrieved the water quality datasondes deployed on October 1st which captured the water impacts of Hurricane Milton. Thankfully, all sonde stations appeared undamaged by the storm. It’s also important to note that water temperatures are finally dropping from around 30 deg C on 10/1 to closer to 25.5 deg C on 10/22. Biofouling, where algae and microorganisms adhere to datasondes, is also starting to decline—something that usually occurs during the cooler months at EBAP stations.
While in the field, staff also collected grab samples that will be analyzed for Vibrio (a bacteria that naturally live in certain coastal waters) as part of a statewide collaboration coordinated through the University of Florida. Grab samples are a single sample or measurement taken at a specific time or over a short period.
After analyzing the data from the sondes, it appears that there was approximately 1.5 meters (about 5 feet) of storm surge from Hurricane Milton at all sites in Estero Bay (Figure 1). It also appears that this surge created different impacts on salinity at three of the datasonde sites—EB01b - the northernmost site, EB02 - the middle site, and EB03 - the southernmost site. When referring to Figure 2, the saltiest (EB02, b) and freshest (EB03, c) sites showed a gradual decrease in salinity after the storm, whereas the site with intermediate salinity (EB01b, a) showed a sharp increase in salinity and quick recovery following the storm. At this time, it is unclear why these sites had these particular conditions.
Post Storm Assessments of Land and Water at Charlotte Harbor AP
To pair up field activities, CHAP staff gave Environmental Resource Permitting staff a ride to Little Gasparilla Island for a wetlands determination. At the same time, CHAP conducted rookery monitoring and post-storm island assessments. Unfortunately, one of the spoil islands that CHAP monitors was completely washed over. A spoil island is an artificial island created as a byproduct of channel dredging. There are no longer any trees on the island. Staff have been documenting erosion on this island for over a decade. Despite that, there has been documented nesting activity there including Reddish Egrets, a state-threatened species.
Charlotte Harbor AP Checks Water Stats from Hurricane Milton
CHAP Staff also swapped out the water quality instruments in Matlacha Pass AP and collected water samples as part of their regular sampling. They too collected samples to test for Vibrio in Charlotte Harbor as part of the research project through University of Florida.
Staff are just starting to dive into what the data shows from the back-to-back storm events. Staff were interested in comparing the depth data from both Helene and Milton because the associated storm surges were unique to each station and storm based on the tracking. Charlotte Harbor East Wall had the highest surge documented, which was 3.01m during Milton (Figure 1). At the Matlacha Pass Bridge site, the two hurricanes had almost identical depths documented during the storm surge (Figure 2). This data is still preliminary, and staff will continue to look at how the hurricanes affected the different water quality parameters at each station.
SE Region
Survey Completions!
CRCP staff completed all of the primary sites for the 2024 Disturbance Response Monitoring Surveys as of October 24th! This data is collected as a collaborative effort across the jurisdictions of the Florida Reef Tract and has proven to be an extremely valuable resource for analyzing long-term trends in coral health and demographics in south Florida. Big thank you to Taylor Tucker and Matt Ringstad for organizing all of the dive days!