To begin, thank you for returning to my blog. As you know, I arrived at OIMB last week and am ecstatic to be researching the reproductive phenology of eelgrass (Zostera marina) during the course of this REU program. To give you a little background information, eelgrass is a marine angiosperm that commonly grows in shallow waters of areas such as bays and estuaries. The beds and meadows formed by this flowering plant create highly productive ecosystems that support a myriad of organisms. For instance, eelgrass beds act as nurseries and spawning areas for numerous commercially important species, such as salmon and Dungeness crabs; they also serve as shelter for many fish and invertebrates and as a source of food for a variety of waterfowl. Furthermore, eelgrass beds decrease coastal erosion and improve water quality.
Interestingly, eelgrass can reproduce both asexually, which involves the creation of new vegetative shoots via elongation of the plant’s rhizome, and sexually, which entails the production of flowers and seeds. I will largely be focusing on aspects of eelgrass sexual reproduction this summer, especially since there is limited information available about eelgrass flowering shoots in the South Slough estuary. Unfortunately, eelgrass populations at many sites throughout South Slough have been experiencing significant declines since 2015 and 2016; thus, the data collected from my project will hopefully be applied to future seeding restoration projects with the goal of increasing eelgrass abundance in the estuary. The low tide series this week afforded me the remarkable opportunity to gain some experience in the field, so every day this week has mainly consisted of exciting fieldwork and, in turn, data collection for my project. In many ways, being able to see my research organism in person for the first time and having the chance to actually examine everything that I have been reading about was awe-inspiring. Ali is very knowledgeable, and she has been really patient as I have been learning many new things this week. Additionally, I finally met Lara Breitkreutz in person this week, who is a graduate research fellow that I will be working closely with this summer since she is also interested in eelgrass reproductive ecology. Both her and her advisor Fiona have been great resources for learning more information about eelgrass and for advice on my project. To give a quick summary of the specifics of my week, all of the REU students went camping at Sunset Bay State Park this past weekend. During the trip, we all went hiking, and we hung out on the beach for a few hours enjoying some unusually warm weather by Oregon standards. This was actually my first time going camping, so sharing this unique experience with my fellow REUs was pretty fun. During the week, I visited Valino Island, Danger Point, Clam Island, and Fossil Point for some data sampling. For reference, Danger Point derives its name from the fact that you can sink almost waist deep in the mudflats there, so I quickly learned that I am not adept at walking through the mud. I ended up having to army crawl across the mudflat because I kept getting stuck, which was probably pretty comical to watch, and I ended up being absolutely covered in the unpleasant smelling muck. Finally, near the end of the week, Lara and I completed some initial eelgrass flowering shoot processing, which took a while, but it was fun working with her and looking at the different parts of the shoot.
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AuthorHi everyone! My name is Chloe Cummins, and I am from Loretto, Tennessee. I am a rising senior at the University of Tennessee Southern where I am pursuing a B.S. degree in Biology (with a concentration in Wildlife Biology and Ecology) and a minor in Sustainability. I’m super excited to be researching the reproductive ecology of eelgrass with my mentor Ali Helms at the South Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve during my time here at OIMB! Archives
August 2022
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