Community Dynamics along a Salinity Gradient in Florida Bay

Project Investigators: Mike Robblee, Ed Matheson, Gordon Thayer, Lawrence Rozas Project Personnel: Andre Daniels Project Start Date: 1998 End Date: 2003 Project Summaries Publications

Summary

Project objectives include documenting fish and shrimp community structure: at the end of the dry season and wet season; along local depth gradients; in relation to seagrass micro-habitat; and in years when the bay functioned as a positive estuary and as a negative estuary.

This project evaluates seagrass associated fish and invertebrate (caridean and penaeid shrimp) community structure in relation to seagrass and salinity across Florida Bay. Project objectives include documenting fish and shrimp community structure: at the end of the dry season (annual high salinity) and wet season (annual low salinity); along local depth gradients (bank, basin and near key); in relation to seagrass micro-habitat (seagrass blade density, blade length, biomass, etc.); and in years when the bay functioned as a positive estuary and as a negative estuary. Field collections have been completed. Field collections were planned for three years, however, when it became apparent that hopes for hypersaline conditions were not going to occur fieldwork was stopped after two years. Sample processing has been delayed but is nearing completion. The Oracle database planned for this project, located at Everglades National Park, is running. Data entry is underway.

Project Summaries

• 2001
• 2002

Publications

Abstracts

• Southern Biscayne Bay Nearshore Fish and Invertebrate Community Structure (from the GEER Conference, April 2003)
• The Relationship of Seagrass-Associated Fish and Crustacean Communities to Habitat Gradients in Florida Bay (from the GEER Conference, April 2003)