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SoMAS Lecture: The Grass Withers And The Flowers Fade: The Global Seagrass Die-Off at Stony Brook Southampton
October 20, 2017 @ 7:30 pm - 8:30 pm
FreeThis Friday, October 20th at 7:30pm, Dr. Bradley Peterson
from Stony Brook University will present a lecture titled:
“The grass withers and the flowers fade” – The global seagrass die-off and one groups effort to understand and combat it.
in the Duke Lecture Hall of Chancellor’s Hall on the Stony Brook Southampton Campus.
Seminar: 7:30 – 8:30pm
The abstract of the talk appears below. We hope to see you there!
Seagrasses, marine flowering plants, have a long evolutionary history but are now challenged with rapid environmental changes as a result of coastal human population pressures. Seagrasses provide key ecological services, including organic carbon production and export, nutrient cycling, sediment stabilization, enhanced biodiversity, and trophic transfers to adjacent habitats. On Long Island, they are essential settling sites for shellfish and important nursery grounds for finfish. They also serve as “coastal canaries”, global biological sentinels of increasing anthropogenic influences in coastal ecosystems, with large-scale losses reported worldwide. Multiple stressors, including sediment and nutrient runoff, physical disturbance, invasive species, fishing practices, aquaculture, overgrazing, algal blooms, and global warming, cause seagrassdeclines at scales of meters to hundreds of square kilometers. Reported seagrass losses have led to increased awareness of the need for seagrassprotection, monitoring, management, and restoration.
