Seaira- Aquatic Plant Life

This week I was considering what plants I want to take presses of and which aspects of the plants I would like to know more about. I was studying sea grass species this week, and during this study it brought my research in a slightly different direction. Recently it has been brought to my attention that there are an abnormally high amount of algae blooms in the Indian River Lagoon, which is in turn having an effect of the wildlife, including the sea grass beds. How could algae affect an aquatic grass species? Well what I found out was very interesting especially considering the recent developments in the Indian River Lagoon. Algae blooms are caused by storm water runoff carrying excess nitrogen and phosphorus, which can be from animal waste, or fertilizers. It turns out that sea grass is actually an evolved species of terrestrial grasses. Sea grass is considered to be more of a plant than a macro-algae. Algae can utilize sunlight very effectively for photosynthesis, however the sea grass only has chloroplast structures with in its leaves. Sea grass  is also directly effected by water clarity, therefore as turbidity increases less sunlight reaches the plants for photosynthesis. This in turn also depletes the water of dissolved oxygen, which is needed for the organisms, who inhabit the sea grass beds, to survive. The sea grass is home to about 40,000 species of fish, and 50 million invertebrates. This vital ecosystem, is also effected by sediment loading; normal suspended sediments will eventually sink and help anchor the sea grass roots, but in excess it can block sunlight from the grasses.Through this research I became really excited because I have the ability to test for phosphorus, oxygen, and salinity. I thought maybe that I could gather data from different locations of sea grass beds, and compare the oxygen and phosphorus levels to the waters turbidity. I would also like to see if there were areas in the Indian River Lagoon where concentrations were higher, and observe how the grasses are affected, as well as possibly finding a source of contamination. I still would like to make a GIS (Geographic Information Systems) map of my data. I would like to pin point specific locations of sea grass beds, and include their nutrient data as a visual representation of the varying concentrations. I also will incorporate a scatter plot graph to compare nutrient content to water clarity. I am excited for the results of this research, I hope that in some way it can help with the influx of algae blooms we are experiencing now. I can truly say I am ecstatic about sea grass, I never realized what a fascinating and important ecosystem came along with it.