Science Serving South Carolina’s Coast
South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium
2005-2006 NSGO Annual Progress Report
Covering the Period
March 1, 2005 to February 28, 2006
Submitted August 30, 2006
South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium
287 Meeting Street
Charleston, SC 29401
www.scseagrant.org
2005-2006 NSGO Annual Progress Report
South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium
Table of Contents
Introduction 3
Section I – Award Reporting 3
Core Sea Grant Program 3
Ecosystem Dynamics 3
Coastal Natural Hazards 9
Marine Aquaculture and Fisheries 9
Coastal Communities and Economies 17
Marine Education 18
Smart Growth Initiative 21
National Strategic Investments 22
National Marine Aquaculture Initiative 22
Gulf Oyster Industry Program 24
Section II - Impacts 27
Section III – N/A 33
Section IV – Appendices 33
Management Team and Staff 33
Program Development Projects 34
Partnerships 35
Leveraged Funds 41
Publications 43
Students Supported 50
Program Awards and Honors 50
2005-2006 NSGO Annual Progress Report
South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium
INTRODUCTION
This annual report, submitted by the South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium, summarizes activities and accomplishments by the Consortium and its partners for the period March 1, 2005 through February 28, 2006.
SECTION I
The following summaries resulted from work conducted under the Consortium’s 2005-2006 Omnibus Sea Grant Program Plan, and are organized by strategic area. All core projects were funded under award number NA16RG2250. Summaries are also provided for the Consortium’s three Sea Grant NSI projects; separate award numbers were assigned.
- Ecosystem Dynamics
Grantee (Principal Investigator) and Institution: James Morris, et al, University of South Carolina
Award Number: NA16RG2250 (R/ER-24)
Time Period: March 1, 2005 through Feb. 28, 2006
Award Title: Succession of Tidal Wetlands on the Cooper River, SC: Ecological Functions and Management Alternatives
Complete Project Report: Available at SCSGC office.
Accomplishments and Outcomes: The project’s first objective is to test the hypothesis that impoundments are a significant component of the dissolved oxygen (DO) dynamics of the Cooper River system. As of now, the water quality and hydrologic field work planned during this project is complete. A seed grant was awarded last year to support additional field work analysis by graduate student David Joyner. His results will refine the work in this project. He is expected to finish his work during summer 2006. The second objective tests the hypothesis that sediment accumulation rates differ by macrophyte community type. The work on this objective is complete. A final report was submitted by Joe Kelley in October 2005. The following is the abstract from that report:
Sediment deposition differs by community type. Subtidal communities (Submerged Aquatic Vegetation - 3.2 cm/yr and Floating Leaf Vegetation - 8.9 cm/yr) have the highest accretion rates and intertidal communities (Intertidal Emergent Marsh - 1.4 cm/yr and Developing Swamp Forest - .7 cm/yr) the lowest. Accumulations differ by season but not by distance from a creek in intertidal emergent communities.
The focus of the third project objective is to further develop the mechanistic spatial simulation model of wetland succession by incorporating the results of past and proposed field work on impoundment bathymetry, spatially varying sedimentation rates, plant community biomass and successional characteristics, and water quality. With regard to status: the final work on this objective is also dependent on the completion of the seed grant work as described above.
Finally, our fourth main objective is to characterize the ecological consequences of management alternatives that are of interest to resource managers and stakeholder groups along the Cooper River. Final work on this objective is also dependent on the completion of the seed grant work as described above.
Grantee (Principal Investigator) and Institution: Susan Wilde, SC Department of Natural Resources
Award Number: NA16RG2250 (R/ER-25)
Time Period: March 1, 2005 through Feb. 28, 2006
Award Title: The Effectiveness of Vegetative Buffers in Reducing Nonpoint Source Pollution in Stormwater Detention Ponds
Complete Project Report: Available at SCSGC office.
Accomplishments and Outcomes: The objective to establish baseline water and nutrient budgets of the watersheds, and pond water and sediment physical, chemical (e.g. nutrients), and biological (e.g. chlorophyll a, harmful algae, fecal coliform bacteria, viruses) properties, so that pre-treatment conditions can be documented and compared, is completed. Year one of this research project focused on detailing the water and nutrient budgets of the watershed. Additionally, during this time period and throughout the second year of the project, research efforts were focused on physical, chemical and biological properties of detention ponds at Kiawah Island including the proposed control and treatment pond for this study. It has been established that these ponds promote the formation of harmful algal blooms and that they are tidally influenced and therefore linked to surrounding estuaries, thus have implications for degrading estuarine health.
The second year of research (2005-2006) continued the intensive investigation of six brackish detention ponds located on Kiawah Island to determine the relationship between land use, environmental properties, and phytoplankton community dynamics. It also addressed development within the watersheds linked to the ponds and how placement in a system of several ponds can affect phytoplankton community in the pond and the adjacent estuary.
We found moderate to high amounts of dissolved inorganic nitrogen and orthophosphate enter the control and treatment ponds during stormwater rain events and through groundwater sources. The amount of stormwater entering the ponds varied by storm event, season, position of stormwater grate in the watershed, and by pond, suggesting that seasonal land uses and development in the watersheds have an impact on nutrients entering the ponds during storm events. Additionally, a significant negative correlation between salinity and nitritite+nitrate, and between salinity and orthophosphate across the larger datasets, further supports the idea that movement of nutrients from terrestrial surfaces to the ponds is facilitated by the stormwater pipes. The upper sediment layers in the control and treatment ponds contained excessive amounts of dissolved inorganic nitrogen and orthophosphate. Orthophosphate levels would indicate that all ponds evaluated would fit into the highly eutrophic categories established by Bricker, et. al (National Estuarine Eutrophication Assessment, NOAA). Analysis of N:P Redfield ratios from all of the ponds and the full dataset suggests that the ponds were phosphorus replete. The samples categorized as hyper-eutrophic based on chlorophyll a values were taken from all ponds, but the majority (60%) in this classification came from golf course ponds (K5 and K56). The species in these ponds that were most frequently noted as bloom species were from the cyanobacteria group. The control pond was colonized by a persistent Microcystis aeruginosa bloom that appeared in the late summer/early fall and lasted until mid-January. This bloom produced very high amounts of the hepatotoxin, Microcystin.
The persistence of the toxic blooms in these ponds has implications for the Kiawah wildlife and residents and for the entire estuarine watershed that receives water from these ponds. The results from these intensive sampling effort have clearly established the prevalence of algal blooms and their associated toxins. Nutrient levels are so elevated that harmful blooms persist at all times of year. The design for the constructed wetland will address the nitrogen levels by providing treatment, and has the potential for nutrient removal prior to stormwater entering the ponds.
Grantee (Principal Investigator) and Institution: Robert Feller, University of South Carolina
Award Number: NA16RG2250 (R/ER-26)
Time Period: March 1, 2005 through Feb. 28, 2006
Award Title: Control of Saltmarsh Cordgrass by Blue Crab Predation on Periwinkle Snails: An Immunological Gut Check
Complete Project Report: Available at SCSGC office.
Accomplishments and Outcomes: Specificity and sensitivity of the existing polyclonal antisera were tested using micro-Ouchterlony double immunodiffusion templates. As expected, the numbers of precipitin lines forming were reduced from the numbers measured years earlier, but numbers were still sufficiently high and staining intensity great enough to eliminate concerns about cross-reactivity (non-specificity) and sensitivity (ability to detect nanogram quantities of soluble protein in gut content mixtures). Self-reactions with the Littoraria antiserum and Littoraria foot-muscle antigen yielded 9 precipitin lines (vs 12 earlier), with the Callinectes antiserum and Callinectes muscle antigen yielded 12 lines (vs 12 earlier), with the Spartina antiserum and plant extract antigen, only 1 line (vs 8 earlier), and Illyanassa antiserum and its foot-muscle extract antigen yielded 3 (vs 9 earlier) precipitin lines.
Field collections were made in North Inlet, South Carolina, on Hobcaw Barony property under auspices of the North Inlet-Winyah Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve. Organisms were housed in the wet lab facility of the Baruch Marine Field Laboratory on site or in aquaria in our laboratory at USC in Columbia, SC.
Control immunoassays provided information similar to what was found in specificity and sensitivity tests mentioned above. We were unable to elicit any strong precipitin line formation with Spartina antisera when testing periwinkle snails that had been feeding on Spartina. The Spartina polyclonal antiserum had lost too much of its immunogenicity to be useful in field tests of the gut contents of periwinkle snails. A single precipitin line was insufficient to demonstrate specificity, hence this aspect of the project was greatly attenuated.
Various size blue crabs were starved and then fed known quantities of periwinkle snail meat, including opercula, with a minimum of two snails per feeding (= 0.84 g wet weight meal). These animals were then serially sacrificed at the following times: 0.5,1,2,4,6,8,9,10,12,24,48 hours. Gut contents were examined visually and the same gut content material then was probed immunologically with the antiserum to periwinkle snails. Visual identification of the opercula was possible in 49 of 62 different crabs up to a digestion time of 12 hours but impossible in 2 of 2 crabs at 24 and 2 of 2 crabs at 48 hr digestion times. Thus opercula were visually identifiable with 79% certainty for 12 hours after a known meal. This visual certainty would be virtually zero after 6 hr in field-collected crabs, because the pieces of operculum seen between 6 and 12 hr could be identified only because it was known beforehand that opercula were ingested. The immunological identification of periwinkle meals was 83% accurate up to 12 hours post-ingestion, meals being identified correctly in 50 of 60 animals. For digestion times exceeding 12 hours, the immunoassay was positive for the presence of the meal in 13 of 15 cases, indicating that this mode of dietary analysis was much more sensitive for highly digested periwinkle snail meals. Additional trials gave similar results.
Grantee (Principal Investigator) and Institution: Richard Zingmark, University of South Carolina
Award Number: NA16RG2250 (R/ER-27)
Time Period: March 1, 2005 through Feb. 28, 2006
Award Title: Functional Relationships (Coupling) Between Epiphytic Micro algae and Food Webs in a Saltmarsh Estuarine System
Complete Project Report: Available at SCSGC office.
Accomplishments and Outcomes: The objective of this phase of the research was to determine trophic transfers between the epiphytic algae on Spartina alterniflora and herbivore species that are linked with commercially important fish and shellfish species. During year one we chose two herbivores: the marsh periwinkle Littoraria irrorata (previously linked to blue crabs), and the grass shrimp Palaemonetes pugio (previously linked to various species of commercial fish species).
Our early efforts have focused on stomach and fecal contents of L. irrorata, where we found significant quantities of various species of epiphytic diatoms and Cyanobacteria, occasional pieces of Spartina epidermis and fungal hyphae. Surprisingly, the microalgae appeared unharmed. Over several months we smeared >200 fecal pellets on standard algal agar growth media (F/2) to test whether viable cells passed through the gut. Within one week of every inoculation, 100% of the smears had a mixture of viable algal colonies growing on them. Most were diatoms (so far 18 species), but we also isolated 7 green algae, 2 red algae, and at least 4 species of Cyanobacteria.
There is a large body of literature reporting the rate at which various herbivores feed on microalgae, and they typically report grazing success as the number of cells consumed per unit time. Many go further and relate feeding rates to growth rates. As there are scattered literature reports of viable algae passing through the gut of some aquatic and marine herbivores (e.g. Porter 1973; Nicotri 1977) we call into question the assumption that algae that are consumed are automatically assimilated into the metabolism and tissues of the herbivores that eat them. We have planned future experiments to feed 14C-labeled microalgae to L. irrorata and to test for uptake in snail tissues and will look for microalgal cell viability in feces of P. pugio.
We have also done some preliminary manipulative grazing experiments in a small tidal creek in North Inlet Estuary. We placed filter papers into Bly Creek and allowed microalgae to colonize and grow on them, and we subsequently determined their chlorophyll a content. We then taped these filters containing algae to dowels and placed them upright in cages in the intertidal portion of the creek to serve as “artificial Spartina stems. We then added 0, 20 or 50 individuals of the grass shrimp Palaemonetes pugio and looked for changes in chlorophyll concentrations on the papers over several tidal cycles and demonstrated that the algae are removed during high tide (Fig. 1). We are repeating this experiment on a seasonal basis. We have yet to determine what other grazers, if any, are present in the tidal waters that actually participated in the grazing but are following up on this now.
During the second year of the grant we plan to use stable isotopes to link feeding and assimilation patterns of periwinkles, grass shrimp and mummichogs to the epiphytic microalgae. Though despite the fact we have evidence (above) that calls into question the nutritional significance of grazing, we expect to find that a portion of the organic matter comprising the epiphytes is incorporated into the body tissues of their grazers.
Fig. 1. Results of experiment completed in October 2005. Changes in chlorophyll a concentration of epiphytic microalgae adhering to filters attached to caged dowels (simulated Spartina stems) and exposed to 0,
20, or 50 individuals of P. pugio in situ over three days (6 tidal cycles).
Evaluation of our data will bridge gaps in our understanding of how relatively undisturbed salt marsh systems are linked between coastal ocean carbon and estuarine food webs, and ultimately will help us learn specific food web linkages between oceanic and estuarine organisms. An understanding of how carbon is transformed in this system will yield insights into general principles of ecosystem development. Like a multi-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, knowledge of the structure, spatial and temporal dynamics, and functional significance of the phytoplankton and epiphytic algal communities in salt marshes involves identifying and correctly placing various discrete pieces together until the picture is complete. Our proposed research, based upon hypotheses developed out of the published results of previous investigators and our own, intends to identify and assemble many of these pieces. In the end we hope to link the phytoplankton and epiphytic communities through trophic connections with commercially and recreationally important fish and shellfish species, which will satisfy at least one of SC Sea Grant’s targeted goals for this funding cycle.