Crabs and Mangroves in Jobos Bay Puerto Rico

Mangrove System in Jobos Bay, Puerto Rico.

One Coastal Fellow at the University of Rhode Island, Ryann Rossi, is currently working on a fascinating 3-part project with her mentor, Brita Jessen, out of both the Bay Campus at URI and Jobos Bay, Puerto Rico. Rossi’s work for Jessen’s dissertation at the Graduate School of Oceanography at URI is entitled “Ecological Effects of Nutrient Enrichment in a Coastal Mangrove System.” Jessen’s dissertation consists of three parts, one of which we discussed in detail with her and Rossi. They are studying the effects of agriculture and urban sprawl, and the associated nutrients they bring on mangrove systems in southern Puerto Rico.

Nutrients may sound good for humans, but for our ecosystems they can often mean bad news. An abundance of nutrients are introduced to ecosystems by fertilizers and pollution. They can wreak havoc upon the natural state of the environment. While the effects of nutrients on the environment have frequently been studied in developed countries such as the United States, there is a lack of studies of the problem in less developed countries such as Puerto Rico. Not only are Jessen and Rossi studying nutrient cycling in an area that has been virtually unexamined, they are studying in an area of growth and dynamism – Puerto Rico is rapidly being affected by urbanization and agricultural development. Monsanto and Pioneer – two of the largest agricultural industries in the world – have recently announced they will be expanding their facilities in Puerto Rico. Since 2003 more than 50 pharmaceutical facilities and 49 medical device companies have set up shop, and more than $4 billion has been invested in biotechnology manufacturing facilities. As the urbanized areas in Puerto Rico switch over from septic systems to sewage systems, there may be a lessening of nutrient overload from human sanitation; however, urbanization and agricultural development will likely outpace the improvements made by the transition to sewage systems.

Ryann Rossi eating lunch in the field.

The particular environment in which Jessen and Rossi are conducting their studies is the mangrove system. Mangroves are natural barriers between the sea and land and are natural carbon sinks, meaning they accumulate and store carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the sea, land and atmosphere. Like the salt marshes and wetlands here in Rhode Island, they too are feeding and nursery grounds for countless species. Tropical areas typically have lower nutrient concentrations, and thus, clearer waters than temperate regions. In order to accommodate for the lack of data, Jessen and Rossi are adapting their research from work done by Jessen’s graduate advisor, Dr. Scott Nixon. Their studies are similar to those that have been conducted in salt marshes all over the coastlines of America.

Nutrient enrichment stimulates microbial activity, which increases the rate of decomposition of materials such as leaves, seaweed and dead fish. Another key player in the decomposition of organic materials are crabs. And in Puerto Rico, there are many species. Crabs are “shredders” and the primary consumers of mangrove leaves. In the words of Rossi, crabs are “ecosystem engineers.” By this she means that they alter the habitat by increasing the rate of decomposition of mangrove leaves and other decaying material. They also dig burrows, which mix sediments and bring oxygen to roots in the peat-based sediment.In order to examine the effects of nutrient overload in the relatively unstudied ecosystem of mangroves, Jessen and Rossi have created a group of mini-ecosystem testing grounds in Jobos Bay to determine how various levels of nutrients will affect the mangrove systems. They have simulated the effects of both agriculture and urban development, while maintaining several control plots. In the urban testing areas, they are using a water-based fertilizer with a nitrogen to phosphate ratio of 16:1, while the agriculturally effected plots, use a water-based fertilizer with a nitrogen to phosphate ratio of 50:1. Both ratios are similar to what is found to contribute in temperate areas. The control plots maintain their natural nitrogen to phosphate ratios.

A quarter compared to the size of a
hole dug by a crab (ecosystem engineers).

Jessen and Rossi’s research not only tests the effects of agricultural development and urbanization on mangroves, but also – within the different test plots – what exactly is leading to the decomposition of leaves. In other words, is it microbial activity from the increased nutrients or the feeding of crabs that primarily contributes to the breakdown of leaves and increases the stability of the peat-based sediment? Jessen and Rossi know that fertilizers (nutrients) speed up microbial processes and thus, increase degradation rates with increasing levels of pollution. Sea level rise and the ability of the coastline of Puerto Rico to handle it is also an issue of concern.

In order to test the effects of anthropogenic growth, Jessen and Rossi have placed yellow leaves (those that are about to fall off the plant) inside mesh “litter” bags in each testing site so that only microbes (not crabs) can feed on them. Each bag contains approximately four grams of leaves, about 7-9 leaves. Three bags were left at each site during their last visit in early July. They’ll return to Jobos Bay in early August to weigh the bags to see how much has been broken down by microbial degradation during the interim. They will then compare the amount of microbial breakdown of the leaves within the bags to the amount of degradation of leaves that have been exposed to crabs. The crab-exposed yellow leaves have been marked by Rossi’s careful work of tying strings to each one. The final weights of the exposed and contained leaves will allow the pair to make a comparison between the amount of microbial (inorganic) decomposition and organic degradation by crabs.

Jessen and Rossi are highly enthusiastic about their research and experiences in Puerto Rico. They are very grateful to their funders, some of whom include The Nature Conservancy, the R.I. and Puerto Rico Sea Grants and the U.S. Forest Service. The URI Coastal Institute and National Estuarine Research Reserve in Jobos Bay, Puerto Rico have provided fellowships for both.

Jessen is always looking for willing and motivated students to volunteer to work with her on her exciting dissertation studies. If you have an interest, please contact her at bjessen@gso.uri.edu.

Brita Jessen of Boston, MA attended Wellesley College for her undergraduate studies and is currently studying biological oceanography under the guidance of Professor Scott Nixon. Ryann Rossi of Malta, NY will graduate from URI with a B.S. in marine biology in 2013.

Elizabeth Gooding & Lesley Lambert

WPWA Survey for Aquatic Invasive Plants

Volunteers paddle among
nuisance pond plants

The Wood-Pawcatuck Watershed Association (WPWA) – in conjunction with URI Watershed Watch, RI Natural History Survey, and RIDEM – hosted a two-part invasive species workshop this past week. The first part of the workshop was held at the Coastal Institute at URI’s Kingston Campus on Thursday, July 14^th from 6:00 to 8:30 PM. This portion of the workshop focused on educating volunteers about aquatic plant ecology, training them to identify the invasive plants, and discussing with them all that a survey entails. The second part of the workshop took place on Saturday, July 16^th from 9:00AM to 12:00 noon at the Kingston Community Center at Asa Pond in South Kingston.

A view finder allows you to look
under the surface of the water

It was here that the volunteers reviewed and put into practice the identification skills they developed in part one of the workshop. The volunteers learned how to conduct the survey from boats, canoes, and kayaks. Anyone with access to a boat was welcome to join in the free survey. Plant identification guides and other necessary materials were provided free of charge. One such material involved in the survey were viewfinders, which are essentially see-through cylinders that allowed participants to view the submerged aquatic vegetation without any glare from the sun. Secchi disks were used to test the turbidity of the water. Volunteers gathered samples from the pond and placed them in bags labeled with their location and then marked that location on a map of the pond.

Native floating heart (white flowers)

Invasive species can have a significant impact on the ecosystems they invade and Asa Pond is no exception. While plants are generally considered beneficial to aquatic ecosystems, as they lower the water temperature through shading and prevent erosion, invasive plants can disrupt the natural ecosystem when they out-compete native species. According to Elizabeth Herron, who has worked for the URI Watershed Watch since 1992, the most common submerged invasives in the Rhode Island are – in decreasing order of abundance – variable leaf milfoil and fanwort. These species are particularly prolific because they can reproduce from fragments; in other words, a piece of one of these plants can grown into its own full-grown plant. Also, as may be the case with purple loosestrife overtaking native loosestrife and nymphoides peltata out-competing native floating heart, the bright colors of the invasives are more attractive to pollinators, which leads to more seeds being spread of the invasives and, thus, their proliferation.

Invasive yellow floating heart

Herbicides are the most effective means of combating the overabundance of invasive species and some have even been developed to specifically target invasives while leaving native plants unscathed. Unfortunately, herbicides can be very expensive and require a permit from the Department of Environmental Management; thus, they are not always a viable option for control of non-native species. Preventing the introduction of invasive species is generally the most desirable option; however, many people introduce invasives unknowingly and, education and outreach are important. Oftentimes, boats will introduce invasives when they are not properly washed. Similarly, plant fragments that remain in trail/bait buckets can lead to the introduction of invasives to areas where they’ve not previously been seen. Protocol for cleaning boats and buckets is currently being established. WPWA is currently working with groups in Connecticut to get support for invasive aquatic plant monitoring.

Variable Milfoil is an invasive species

The good news is that despite the heavy public use of Asa Pond, no invasive aquatic plants were detected during the survey. Still, throughout Rhode Island there is much work to be done in terms of preventing the spread of aquatic invasive plants, but through educational public outreach events such as the two-part workshop, progress can be made. If improvements are to be made it will require hard work on the part of volunteers and stakeholders throughout the watershed. If the turnout for this year’s workshop is any indication, there are many citizens concerned with the health of their watershed.

Invasive water chestnut

RELATED LINKS:

http://www.wpwa.org/

http://uri.edu/ce/wq/ww/

http://www.rinhs.org/

http://www.dem.ri.gov/

Elizabeth Gooding

Stingrays and Skates

Atlantic Stingray

Some people are scared of stingrays, some people like them, and then there are those very few people who live for stingrays. We had the opportunity to meet one such researcher from the University of Rhode Island and his Coastal Fellow who is following in his footsteps. John (Jack) Szczepanski was preparing for a joint meeting of ichthyologists and herbatologists in Minneapolis, when he and his Coastal Fellow, Peter Schooling (Marine Affairs - URI ’13) took a break from their preparations and research to share a brief lunch with us and discuss their interests and research.

Szczepanski gave us some basic details about sting rays to get us started. Stingrays are elasmobranches; like skate rays and sharks they have a skeleton made entirely of cartilage. Certain rays have reinforced jaws which allow them to consume hard species such as crabs, whelks, and snails. Stingrays have strong chemoreception and use their sense of smell to find their food. They store urea in their tissues to control salt intake because unlike most fish they don’t filter out the salt water, rather they store all the nutrients, which makes them taste bad and smell like ammonia. Stingrays are commonly used as lobster bate. They are also sometimes used as faux sea scallops in the Midwest and many species of rays are eaten in certain cultures. Electric rays, which are often found in Rhode Island, appear large and blobby and have an electric organ-muscle. The poisonous barbs on a stingray’s tail (that famously and tragically killed Steve Irwin) can break off and likely do not grow back.

Electric Ray (the red area is the
electric field emitted)

Generally, stingrays move inland during their remarkably long (11 month!) gestation period. An egg case is absorbed in the side of the mother stingray, who eventually gives a live aplacental birth. This type of reproduction is known as ovoviparity; in other words, the ray embryos develop in eggs that are held within the mother until they are ready to hatch. Some rays are rather large when they are born. For example, bull nose rays are generally between 18 and 30 cm at birth. Stingrays do not have a set breeding season. In contrast to stingrays, skates lay eggs, which is one of the major differences between the two otherwise similar species.

Szczepanski with the stingray
that stung him in the hand
on his honeymoon!

Large groups of stingrays (particularly the eagle ray and bull nose ray) migrate north from tropical waters in the summer. They are new but no longer uncommon in RI and have been seen in Narragansett Bay as early as May. Their migration this far north that early in the season may be indicative of climate change. Szczepanski believes their migration patterns may also be indicative of ecological changes because they are generally not commercially fished. Much of Szczepanski’s research takes places in Delaware Bay, which serves as a breeding ground for sharks that are sand-born and then spend the rest of their adult lives offshore. Delaware is very species rich, but comparisons can still be made to RI despite our fewer and smaller populations. Perhaps the most important correlation that can be drawn between the two water bodies is that they are both estuaries – breeding grounds/nurseries for numerous species.

Szczepanski with a stingray
on his honeymoon.

Szczpanski has gone out on many surveys to assess populations of stingrays (including one on July 20, 2010 while he was on his honeymoon and ended up getting stung in the hand!) While out on the boat, he measures the disk width from wing tip to wing tip and length from nose to pelvic fins, determines the sex of the stingray, and then checks for its stomach contents. Szczepanski then weighs and identifies the food from the belly of the stingray. Skates can have their stomach pumped to remove the contents for measurement. Little skates, which are common in Rhode Island eat a variety of food. Among other things, Szczepanski is trying to determine if their diets are more specific in Delaware, where they have a greater variety of food to choose from, than in Rhode Island. Clear nose skates, which are also common in Rhode Island tend to feed on squid, wheat fish, worms, crabs, shrimp, and more. Bull nose rays eat anything from whelks to mud snails and hermit crabs and sometimes even razor clams. Cow nose rays have strong jaws and plate-like teeth which are used for crushing. They, too, eat razor clams. Szczepanski believes that the mechanisms stingrays use to find food are – in order of importance – smell, sight, and electroreception.

Over the course of two years, Szczepanski will perform more than 20 surveys per bay (about one every month) in the Delaware and Narragansett Bays. He hopes to monitor how many stingrays are caught during each trip and their weights and species type. His work takes a serious dedication because he has almost no funding aside from his graduate studies research allowance. Szczepanski says he is grateful to have the cooperation of fishermen who allow him to examine the stingrays caught in their nets.

Elizabeth Gooding

A Nutrient Budget For The Bay

When we think about budgets we usually think in terms of dollars and cents. Do I have enough money to pay the bills, go grocery shopping and go out to the movies? But we can’t calculate the health of an individual or an ecosystem using dollars.  One way to think about the health of an ecosystem though is in terms of supply and demand for nutrients. How much nutrients or food does your dog need to eat to stay healthy? And how much is too much?

Everything needs nutrients to stay alive. Animals must eat to survive, and so do plants, algae, fungus and bacteria. Animals soak up necessary nutrients as they digest the fruits, vegetables and meat we eat. Plants and other sedentary (non-moving) life forms take in nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus from their environment—water, earth and air.  When an animal takes in too much nutrients, the excess is expelled so it can be recycled in the environment and reused by other organisms.

Instead of using dollars to calculate a nutrient budget, we use increments of phosphorous and nitrogen compounds. We can calculate how much nutrients (or food) is needed for an individual to survive by evaluating how much we take in and how much is lost to the environment, and examining the health of that individual.

We can also come up with a nutrient budget for an ecosystem by evaluating the point and non-point sources of nutrients entering the system, and measuring how it is being used and where the excess is going.

Consider the Narragansett Bay ecosystem for a moment. The rivers that feed the Bay also bring all that washes into them. This includes all the stormwater that is not soaked up by the trees, grass and plants, all the water from washing our cars and watering our lawns, and all the discharge from wastewater treatment plants. When it rains, the trash, sediment, heavy metals and nutrients that collect on roadways, sidewalks and lawns are washed into storm drains that flow into nearby rivers, wastewater treatment plants or just directly into the Bay. In Rhode Island, only a few treatment plants take stormwater, so much of it is not treated at all before it reaches the rivers or Bay. The Bay essentially becomes the dumping ground for all this pollution. So how much nutrients and pollution is too much for the Bay to handle? And how do we know?

Nayatt Point in Barrington, R.I. is already loaded with seaweed.
Conimicut Point has already raked the beach to remove the
seaweed, and the summer has just begun.

In a healthy system, everything lives in balance with each other. Fish kills and shellfish die offs are one type of clue that nutrient levels may be too high. The big stinking mats of seaweed that wash onto our beaches are also evidence of too much nutrients. To figure out just how much is too much, we must first calculate how much is going in.

Graduate student, Jason Krumholz, is calculating the nutrient budget for the Narragansett Bay.  He is testing whether recent reductions to the amount of nutrients going into the Bay –through wastewater treatment plant upgrades and point source restoration (Read our blog on wastewater treatment plant upgrades)- are enough to change the amount of phytoplankton growing in the Bay, which might decrease the amount of organic material being decomposed at the bottom of the Bay, allowing for higher levels of dissolved oxygen throughout the Bay, making the Bay a healthier place for creatures to live. 

Jason Krumholz makes tiny adjustments
on the nutrient analyzer.

Since 2006 Jason has been collecting seasonal monthly water samples at 13 stations around the Bay and analyzing them for concentrations of nitrates, nitrites, ammonia, phosphate, silica and total nitrogen. He also works with other researchers and state agencies to analyze data from the wastewater treatment plants, river loading data, and a number of fixed monitoring stations throughout the bay.  From this data, he can calculate the total amount of nutrients coming into the Bay. The next step is to figure out where all of those nutrients are going. Some of it washes out to the ocean with the tides, some sinks into the sediment to be used later, and some is released back into the atmosphere, but most of it gets used up by the organisms living in the Bay.

Jason Krumholz and his intern Rossi Ennis
working in their lab at the URI Bay Campus in Narragansett.

Jason is already seeing decreases in dissolved inorganic nitrogen, so one might expect to also see decreases in total nitrogen, but this does not seem to be the case. “It is a bit puzzling” Says Jason. “The Bay is doing something else. We are still seeing high levels of phytoplankton” (microscopic algae) which leaves the same possibility for low levels of dissolved oxygen and potential for fish kills. But we can’t expect to see changes over night.  In many similar ecosystems, response to reduction in nutrient loading has taken several years to manifest.  As the Bay adjusts to the lower levels of nutrients coming in, the species of phytoplankton may shift to ones that can live well with lower levels.  But only time will tell.

We can all help make the Bay cleaner though. Jason suggests using diligence and being a mindful consumer. Be conscientious about the fertilizers you use, purchase detergents without phosphates, and pick up after your pet!

Why Are Wastewater Treatment Plants So Important?

Wastewater treatment plants do just as they say. They treat the water that goes down our drains before releasing it back into the environment. Wastewater treatment plants have evolved considerably over time. Their first, and most important purpose is to clear the water we use in our homes of solid materials. This process of screening and settlement is known as primary treatment. Although this removes the largest debris items, the wastewater is still full of organic material, which doesn’t smell great and, if dumped directly into our water bodies, can contaminate them and consume available oxygen as it decomposes.  This is why virtually all treatment plants in the U.S. use a process of aeration to encourage the growth of beneficial microorganism which break down the biological material in the waste, in a process called secondary treatment.  In many cases the water is then discharged, often after sterilization with Ultra Violet light which kills potentially disease causing bacteria and viruses.  This was the case here in Rhode Island until about 2005.   However as city populations grow, more and more nutrients are going into the wastewater treatment facilities and being discharged into our waterways. These excess nutrients act like fertilizer to the plants and algae living in the water. Unfortunately, too much fertilizer in the Bay is a bad thing. Phytoplankton (tiny microscopic plants) begin to bloom uncontrollably, blocking out sunlight needed by other plants lower in the water column. Once the algae reaches maximum capacity it begins to die off in mass numbers. The dead cells sink to the bottom where bacteria decompose the cells, using up oxygen in the process. As the bacteria pull oxygen out of the water, the fish, shellfish and other organism in the area begin to suffocate. Those that cannot swim away eventually die, providing more food for the oxygen-consuming bacteria.

However, recent advancements in technology and awareness have brought about new technologies which can treat wastewater to remove these nutrients is done in the third phase, known as tertiary treatment. Click here to download an article about wastewater treatment in Rhode Island, and learn “what happens after you flush.”

Countless fish and shellfish
died in Greenwich Bay in 2003
when dissolved oxygen reached
critically low levels for an
extended period of time.

Following the Greenwich Bay fish kill in 2003, Rhode Island passed a law requiring a 50 percent reduction in nitrogen discharges coming out of wastewater treatment plants in the Upper Bay. To date, nine wastewater treatment facilities in the Narragansett Bay Watershed have completed their upgrades, with three more following closely behind. However, the largest treatment facility in Rhode Island, Fields Point, is still under construction.

As these upgrades come on line, we can expect to see conditions clear up in Narragansett Bay. But it won’t happen over night. The Bay, and the creatures living in it will have to adjust to the cleaner waters. Scientists throughout the region are studying various parameters that will likely be affected and improved over time so we can have a baseline understanding of the current conditions and assess the improvements over time.

Come back soon to read about the Nutrient Budget being developed for Narragansett Bay!

August Dissolved Oxygen Survey

NBEP, Brown University and Save the Bay conducted a water quality survey on Thursday, August 19th, and results were much better than expected! The west passage (from the Warwick Neck south to the tip of Jamestown) was well mixed throughout the water column.  The only area our boat saw dissolved oxygen levels below 3.0mg/L (milligrams per liter) was in Greenwich Bay, and even then, only at six of the 14 stations.


NBEP surveys all stations in Greenwich Bay, West Passage and meets up with the Brown boat at the southern station in Upper Bay.

NBEP surveys all stations in Greenwich Bay, West Passage and meets up with the Brown boat at the southern station in Upper Bay.

We not longer survey the Mount Hope Bay or most of the East Passage because low dissolved oxygen levels are rarely found and it is logistically very difficult to cover that area with our three boats. At the end of the summer all data will be posted to the Brown University's Insomniacs website.

Again we found Greenwich Bay to have patches of reddish colored water, and the Sea-bird was giving fairly high flourometry readings (Chlorophyll levels in the water measured in (μg/l, or micrograms per liter) , so we took some water samples with our fine mesh net to analyze back in the lab. Professor David Borkman was kind enough to come help identify the species, which he determined to be Procrocentrum micans, Dinophysis accuminata (not pictured below), and Sanguinium akashiwo.

Lesley and Chris collecting a water sample in Greenwich Cove.

Microscopic view of Sanguinium species.

Microscopic view of Prorocentrum species

Most folks know about eelgrass (Zostera marina), and it's benefits to estuarine critters, however, there is another species of seagrass living in Narragansett Bay. While surveying Apponoug Cove in Greenwich Bay, we came across large, floating patches of widgeon grass (Ruppia maritima). There are several species of seagrass found along the Atlantic Coast, however, many species such as turtle grass (Thalassia testudenum), and manatee grass (Syringodium filiforme) are found only in the warmer waters, south of the Chesapeake Bay.

Underwater Video image of a healthy bed of Ruppia maratima at the mouth of Apponaug Cove.

Patch of R. maratima floating with seaweeds Polysiphonia and Ceramium in Apponaug Cove.

Seagrass is an important estuarine habitat for many reasons. Seagrass beds provide shelter, and feeding grounds for juvenile fish, crabs, shellfish, and birds, and act as a biological filters and erosion control by trapping sediments in its interconnected root structure known as rhizomes. Historically, the southwestern part of Greenwich Bay (Greenwich Cove) was known as Scallop Town because of its healthy beds of shellfish living in and among the seagrass. Unfortunately, seagrass beds have been in decline over the years and efforts to re-vegetate affected areas has had mixed results. Much research has gone into understanding the decline of seagrass beds throughout the Atlantic Coast and globally. Some of the major factors in the decline of seagrass has been attributed to the "wasting disease" of the 1930s, dredging, oil leakage from outboard motorboats, hurricanes, and increased macroalgae due to eutrophication (excessive nutrients in waterways). Boat props can also damage seagrass beds, so it is important to be aware of the area you are boating in, and avoid traveling through an area when you see plant life in your wake.

August Video Survey

We had another great video survey this week! However, the currents were strong which made getting sediment samples difficult because the sediment grab kept on getting swept on its side, causing it to drag sideways along the seafloor, collecting sediment on the top, rather than closing around a proper sample. For many of the stations four times was the charm!

Dropping the sediment grab.

Collecting a sediment sample.

An improper sediment grab
(notice the mud sitting on top of the grab).

While Shelley, from URI was gathering sediment samples with her crew, Chris and Lesley were collecting water samples, measuring water quality with a YSI at both surface and bottom depths, and dropping the underwater video camera to get a look at the seafloor.

Setting up the underwater video camera.

Collecting a water sample.

Dropping the YSI for a water quality reading.

Our survey finished up with a family of swans crossing our path in the Greenwich Bay Marina. Although not as majestic looking, baby swans are hardly ugly ducklings!

Family of Swans crossing the shipping channel in Greenwich Cove.

Seafloor (Benthos) Survey

On June 21, in collaboration with the University of Rhode Island’s Cell & Molecular Biology department, we completed a videotaping survey throughout six different locations in Narragansett Bay.  We will be surveying six locations throughout Greenwich Bay. Click on the map below to see our locations marked in yellow.[googlemaps http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=103382247568443412834.00048af7f4a77de62dac3&t=h&ll=41.671466,-71.435667&spn=0.02943,0.021252&output=embed&w=425&h=350]

Liquid Nitrogen Storage Tank.

Sediment samples

A GPS, in correlation with the program Chartview Pro, was used to track the exact locations that we surveyed so we can return to them each time. At each of the six locations, we used the SeaViewer Underwater camera to capture video clips of the benthic regions in the Bay. We used a YSI to measure temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen (DO), and chlorophyll at surface and bottom depths (click on yellow icons above to see our readings).  A Niskin water sampler was used to take water samples at the bottom, as well as a sediment grab which plunges into the ground to collect sediment samples. The sediment samples were preserved in a liquid nitrogen storage tank. Both sediment and water samples will be tested by the molecular biology students.

Aghardiella (a red branching seaweed) with
Ulva (green "sea lettuce) underneath.

After viewing the video footage, we found a plethora of interesting marine life living in the sediment in the Bay.  For instance, single-celled algae was found, as well as the red algae Aghardiella species and Gracilaria species. Ctenophores, commonly referred to as “comb jellies” were also abundant at the surface and benthic regions in the Bay.  Amphipods, tunicates, and crabs were among the other species found within the sediment.

Aghardiella (a red branching seaweed)

Meet the Science Research Team of 2010

Every year NBEP hires at least one intern to help us out with our summer research. Whether we hire through the RI Department of Environmental Management or the University of Rhode Island, our interns must have a strong interest in the environment and have at least two years of higher education schooling in marine or environmental sciences.

The Veterans

Dr. Chris Deacutis

Dr. Chris Deacutis — Has been the Chief Scientist for NBEP since 1993.  Prior to joining the NBEP team, Chris worked with RI Department of Environmental Management in the Division of Water Resources. It was his research and suggestion of hypoxic problems in Narragansett Bay that sparked the efforts of the Insomniacs in 1999. From the summer of 1999 to 2003 Chris organized and coordinated nighttime dissolved oxygen surveys. Since 2004 Chris has been collaborating with Brown University and the University of Rhode Island to conduct daytime dissolved oxygen surveys throughout the summer.

 

Lesley Lambert

Lesley Lambert — After graduating from Roger Williams University in 2005 with a major in Marine Biology and a minor in Economics, I began working with NBEP in 2006 as an RIDEM intern and had the great fortune to continue with the program, becoming Project Coordinator. I have recently become the Digital Communication Manager, so in addition to conducting the summer research and mentoring our interns, I am now in charge of maintaining our website, designing the Narragansett Bay Journal, and other outreach materials and events.

2010 Interns:

Rebecca Sacks

Rebecca Sacks — Becca is a senior at the University of Rhode Island, majoring in Marine Biology. She began working with us during the spring semester while maintaining a full course schedule. In the past four months she has received experience in analyzing aerial photographs as well as algae identification and biomass estimates through ground truthing. We look forward to having Becca on our team and showing her the ropes of working in the local environmental field.

Bart Johnsen-Harris

Bart Johnsen-Harris — Bart is a Junior at Brown University majoring in Environmental Studies. Aside from his strong interests in environmental policy, he is also an outstanding piccolo player and bass singer for Brown's Wind Symphony and "Bear Necessities" a cappella group. Bart will be assisting us on our boat surveys this summer.



We will post our 2011 interns when they come on board next week!

First Water Quality Survey of the Summer

The NBEP science team embarked on our first water quality survey of the season on June 8th. We used the R.I. Department of Environmental Management (RIDEM) boat and left from the East Greenwich Bay Marina. We were able to take measurements at 28 of our 30 fixed sites throughout Greenwich Bay and the west passage of Narragansett Bay before a squall came about and forced us to go in and get out of the inclement weather.

Sudden Squall

The north western part of Greenwich Bay was found to be just at the hypoxic level at 2.9mg/L of dissolved oxygen. However, the southern parts of Greenwich Bay and much of the rest of the Bay was well mixed and oxygen levels were sufficiently high. The squall likely mixed the water  and oxygenated it further.

Marine animals breath oxygen too and when oxygen levels drop below 3mg/L there is not enough oxygen to go around. Creatures that live on the bottom of the bay such as oysters, littlenecks, and marine worms are at a greater risk during hypoxic events because they cannot move to a different area. Schooling fish such as menhaden are also affected by hypoxia because they are often chased into coves by predators such as striped bass and the school will use up the oxygen faster than it can be produced by photosynthesis or mixed into the water at the surface from the air.

Our next water quality survey will occur in the second week of July, however we hope to do a video survey next week to look at the sediments throughout Greenwich Bay.

Our captain Heather and intern Bart.

Lesley and Becca work on gathering the data.