Temporal and Spatial Variation in Seagrass Associated Fish and Invertebrates in Western Florida Bay

Project Investigator: Mike Robblee Project Personnel: Andre Daniels Project Start Date: 1997 End Date: 2002 Project Summaries Publications

Summary

This project documents fish and invertebrate community composition in western Florida Bay in order to assess the bay's response to seagrass and environmental changes over time.

A detailed quantitative database, covering the period October 1984 through April 1987, is available from Johnson Key Basin in western Florida Bay prior to the onset of seagrass die-off. These data describe community dynamics and spatial relationships among seagrass associated caridean shrimp, fishes and the pink shrimp, Penaeus duorarum, in relation to an undisturbed seagrass habitat. As such, the database serves as a baseline against which to assess the response of a seagrass fauna to habitat changes occurring in Florida Bay following seagrass die-off.

The experimental design and sampling protocols employed previously in Johnson Key Basin have been duplicated between October 1994 to April 1997 in order to address the following objectives:

1. to document changes in grass bed structure and habitat complexity in Johnson Key Basin since the mid-1980's;
2. to compare the seasonality of characteristic seagrass associated shrimp and fish populations in Johnson Key Basin prior to and following seagrass die-off; and,
3. to compare quantitative relationships between grass bed structure and animal density and species composition observed in an undisturbed versus a disturbed seagrass system.

Project Summaries

• 2001
• 2002

Publications

Abstracts

• Fish and Shrimp in Relation to Seagrass Habitat Change in Johnson Key Basin, Western Florida Bay (1985-1995) (from the GEER Conference, April 2003)
• Temporal and Spatial Variation in Seagrass Associated Fish and Invertebrates in Johnson Key Basin, Western Florida Bay
• Temporal and Spatial Variation in Seagrass Associated Fish and Invertebrates in Johnson Key Basin, Western Florida Bay (from the South Florida Restoration Science Forum, May 1999)
• Temporal and Spatial Variation in Seagrass Associated Fish and Invertebrates in Western Florida Bay: A Decadal Comparison
• Temporal and Spatial Variation in Seagrass Associated Fish and Invertebrates in Western Florida Bay: A Decadel Comparison (2) (from the Florida Bay Conference Proceedings, 1995)

Flyers

• Empirical and Modeling Studies in Support of Florida Bay Ecosystem Restoration (available from the FISC (Florida Integrated Science Center) - Biology website. Please note that this is a (0.2 Mb) PDF file and requires the FREE Adobe Acrobat Reader® to be read)
• Florida Caribbean Science Center Restoration Ecology Branch