submitted by Tim Carruthers<\/p>\n
As seagrass scientists we take it as a given that:<\/p>\n
The number of journal articles published on seagrasses has increased from less than ten per year in the 1960s up to currently more than 200 per year, while this lags far behind mangroves and corals it shows a significant focus in the scientific community on understanding seagrass ecosystems.<\/p>\n
The more concerning statistic is that for every coral or mangrove paper published, there are\u00a0 (on average) 130\u2013150 media reports\u2014however when it comes to seagrasses, there are only 10 media reports for every scientific paper published\u2026 so, are seagrasses not important? Are they not threatened? Are they just boring? \u2026or have we, the seagrass research community, just not yet found the way to successfully communicate to the broader community?<\/em><\/p>\n A number of key articles in the 1980s demonstrated the link between excessive nutrient inputs and growth of epiphytes, macroalgae or phytoplankton, resulting in seagrass loss. This understanding has been further refined by increased understanding of grazing and other physical impacts such as water movement and temperature on seagrass meadows. Recent papers have synthesized these patterns and trends, to suggest that we are currently approaching a crisis for seagrass ecosystems as multiple pressures (eutrophication, coastal development, climate change) increase in the coastal zone. With 37% of the world\u2019s population living within 100 km of the coast, all of our major coastal habitats are potentially threatened due to increased human pressure\u2014but seagrass habitats are the least known or understood by the public and therefore even more threatened than mangrove or coral habitats.<\/p>\n It seems, in fact, that we have been keeping secrets.<\/p>\n Are seagrass important?<\/em><\/p>\n We know that they are\u2014we all wrote in that last proposal or paper introduction how segrasses support fisheries, reduce coastal erosion, fix carbon and store nutrients.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Are seagrasses threatened?<\/em><\/p>\n We know that they are\u2014more and more of our work is focused on tracking seagrass change and restoration of locations with significant seagrass loss.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Are seagrasses boring?<\/em><\/p>\n So if seagrasses are important, threatened and interesting\u2014why is it that most people don\u2019t know about them and therefore don\u2019t care about them? Could it be that we have not\u00a0 invested enough in diverse ways to communicate to a broad audience? The public definitely can find seagrasses engaging and interesting, I once attended a Seagrasswatch workshop where the community members performed a seagrass dance they were so completely engaged and informed about a scratty little Halophila minor meadow\u2014don\u2019t want to be species\u2019ist, but just to make the point that some other species should be even easier to sell as interesting!<\/p>\n As seagrass scientists (actually, the science community in general) the conventional approach has been to do the best and most accurate science we can and publish it in the best peer reviewed journals \u2013 with the assumption that resource managers and politicians will find the information they need to work with the public and address the challenges facing these habitats (ie preserve them). But clearly this process has not been effective and so an alternate approach might be to still do the best and most accurate science and publish it in the best journals, but to go the next step and produce communication products that decode our detailed science to an interested public audience and also to start working with teachers and educators to ensure that the next generation is fully informed about seagrasses and seagrass issues. An informed public will demand of resource managers and politicians that they preserve or restore coastal ecosystems and maintain seagrass habitats\u2014and ultimately seagrass scientists will be engaged in this information cycle. Some good examples of these forms of communication are happening (a few links are listed below), but we are far, far from having the clear, synthetic communication resources to establish an interested, informed and engaged general public.<\/p>\n If we don\u2019t do this, who will? Politicians? Unlikely, they generally respond to urgent disasters or issues of broad public concern, and as of now there is not broad public realization that seagrasses even exist. Students? Unlikely, there currently are simply not the resources available for teachers to use in the class or educators to use in public settings. Non Government Organizations? Possibly, although they are also limited in their ability to get funds by the lack of awareness of the importance and threatened status of seagrasses. So? \u2026yup, that leaves us\u2014you and me. We are either going to sit by and watch seagrasses continue to decline globally, or we can start developing more communication tools to present our best kept secrets to a broader audience. As individuals, public friendly posters and color newsletters, web sites, working with teachers and educators to develop resources, giving public presentations can all help. Also, emerging communication mechanisms like facebook, twitter, youtube, image libraries, Wikipedia, conceptual diagrams, can be employed to elevate seagrass awareness to non-specialists. In addition, scientific publications about seagrasses could be targeted to non-seagrass scientists, providing more awareness within the scientific community. But what about as an organization? Is there anything WSA could be doing? I suggest that as an organization we have the perfect opportunity to work together and develop synthetic communication products at a global and regional scale, will this mean putting in extra effort? Well yes of course\u2014however, we may not only raise awareness of seagrasses and perhaps increase our grant funding, but may be able to effect a change and slow the rate of seagrass habitat loss as well as the loss of associated ecosystem resources.<\/p>\n http:\/\/www.seagrasswatch.org\/seagrass.html<\/a> Science Communication (please add others)<\/h4>\n Great technical and practical help: http:\/\/bama.ua.edu\/~hsmithso\/class\/bsc_695\/links\/ <\/a> Orth, R.J., Carruthers, T.J.B.,\u00a0 Dennison, W.C.,\u00a0 Duarte, C.M.,\u00a0 Fourqurean, J.W.,\u00a0 Heck, K.L. Jr,\u00a0 Hughes, A.R.,\u00a0 Kendrick, G.A.,\u00a0 Kenworthy, W.J.,\u00a0 Olyarnik, S.,\u00a0 Short, F.T.,\u00a0 Waycott, M.,\u00a0 Williams, S.L. 2006. A Global Crisis for Seagrass Ecosystems. Bioscience 56: 987\u2013996<\/a> Duarte, C.M.,\u00a0 Dennison, W.C.,\u00a0 Orth, R.J.,\u00a0 Carruthers, T.J.B. 2008. The charisma of coastal ecosystems: addressing the imbalance. Estuaries and Coasts 31: 233\u2013238<\/a> Carter, S.L., Mora-Bourgeois, G., Lookingbill, T.R., Carruthers, T.J.B., Dennison, W.C. 2007. The challenge of communicating monitoring results to effect change. The George Wright Forum 24: 48\u201358 Dennison, W.C., Lookingbill, T.R., Carruthers, T.J.B., Hawkey, J.M., Carter, S.M. 2007. An eye-opening approach to developing and communicating integrated environmental assessments. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 5: 307-314<\/a> How can we increase the profile of seagrass ecosystems? Some practical steps for communication. submitted by Tim Carruthers As seagrass scientists we take it as a given that: seagrasses form highly valuable ecosystems, and; seagrasses are threatened by nutrient and sediment inputs, resulting in large scale losses in many locations. The number of journal articles […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2Cwsq-18","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":65,"url":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/65","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":0},"title":"World Oceans Day","author":"Giuseppe","date":"8 June, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Raising the voice for the world\u2019s seagrass on World Oceans Day Seagrass meadows around the world continue to be under threat from the activities of humans. Over fishing, climate change, coastal development, extreme weather and poor land management are all contributing to the continued global loss of these diverse and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Outreach\"","block_context":{"text":"Outreach","link":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/tag\/outreach"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/fish_posidonia-150x150.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":94,"url":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/94","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":1},"title":"Hot off the press: Seagrass Syllabus for resource managers","author":"Siti","date":"5 October, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"A new manual aimed at building knowledge and raising awareness of seagrass habitats has hit the shelves (well not literally)! The training manual, titled \"Seagrass Syllabus\" was developed by The World Seagrass Association and Seagrass-Watch in partnership with Conservation International. The Seagrass Syllabus is the first of a series of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Outreach\"","block_context":{"text":"Outreach","link":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/tag\/outreach"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/10\/WSA-Seagrass-Syllabus-212x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":228,"url":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/228","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":2},"title":"Notes from the field: Yellow River Delta, China","author":"Siti","date":"14 January, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Every so often (but only as often as we receive contributions) we feature a seagrass meadow from around the world. This week, Laura Soissons shares her observations of her field site in the Yellow River Delta in China. Laura is a PhD student with the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Notes from the field"","block_context":{"text":"Notes from the field","link":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/category\/nftf"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/Laura1-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":102,"url":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/102","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":3},"title":"Notes from the Field: Derawan Island, Indonesia","author":"Siti","date":"24 October, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Every fortnight we feature a seagrass meadow from around the world. This week, Marjolijn Christianen shares her experiences working in the beautiful tropical island of Derawan in Indonesia. Marjolijn is currently a PhD student at Radboud University in The Netherlands. She has a blog detailing her experiences working with turtles\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Notes from the field"","block_context":{"text":"Notes from the field","link":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/category\/nftf"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/10\/derawan11.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":328,"url":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/328","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":4},"title":"In memoriam: Evamaria Koch","author":"Siti","date":"20 March, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Today we mourn the passing of one of our own in the seagrass community, Evamaria Koch. Below is a letter from WSA President, Giuseppe Di Carlo. --------------------------------------------------------- 19 March 2014 Dear friends and colleagues, I am writing to some share some terrible news. On Thursday evening (March 13, 2014) our\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 1 comment","block_context":{"text":"With 1 comment","link":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/328#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"eva3","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/eva3.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":368,"url":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/368","url_meta":{"origin":70,"position":5},"title":"ISBW11 Day Three: Fieldtrip fun at Xincun Bay","author":"Siti","date":"11 November, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Mike van Keulen shares his thoughts about the field visit we had to Xincun Bay. Photos and text by Mike van Keulen ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- As part of the ISBW11 activities, we were privileged to visit the Special Seagrass Protection Area in Xincun Bay near the Workshop location on Hainan Island. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Conferences & Workshops"","block_context":{"text":"Conferences & Workshops","link":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/archives\/category\/conferences-workshops"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wsa.seagrassonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The best kept secret<\/h3>\n
\n
\n
\nWe know that they aren\u2019t\u2014and not only are they interesting for seagrass geeks (I confess that my favorite place to dive is seagrass meadows) but they support cryptic rare fauna such as seahorses, seadragons and giant bivalves as well as charismatic megafauna including dugongs, turtles, manatees and even tiger sharks (better keep that one quiet) as well as being great places to go fishing, crabbing or hard clamming.<\/address>\n<\/blockquote>\n
How we can communicate better?<\/h3>\n
The challenge<\/h3>\n
General information on seagrass (please add others)<\/h4>\n
\nhttp:\/\/www.flmnh.ufl.edu\/fish\/SouthFlorida\/seagrass\/Introduction.html<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/counties.cce.cornell.edu\/suffolk\/habitat_restoration\/seagrassli\/ecology\/what_is_seagrass.html<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/www1.coseecoastaltrends.net\/modules\/seagrass\/learn_about\/<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/www.marbef.org\/wiki\/Mediterranean_seagrass_ecosystem<\/a><\/p>\nTeacher\/educator resources on seagrass (please add others)<\/h4>\n
http:\/\/www.reef.crc.org.au\/seagrass\/index.html<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/www.seagrasswatch.org\/education.html<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/www1.coseecoastaltrends.net\/modules\/seagrass\/access_classroom_activities\/<\/a> <\/p>\n
\nDiscussion forum: http:\/\/ian.umces.edu\/discforum\/index.php#3 <\/a>
\nA list of communications tools and resources: http:\/\/ian.umces.edu\/scresources.php <\/a>
\nWell known science communicator: http:\/\/www.edwardtufte.com\/tufte\/index <\/a><\/p>\nRecent relevant articles (please add others)<\/h4>\n
\n(contact tcarruth@umces.edu<\/a> for pdf)<\/p>\n
\n(pdf available under OpenAccess)<\/p>\n
\n(contact tcarruth@umces.edu<\/a> for pdf)<\/p>\n
\n(contact tcarruth@umces.edu<\/a> for pdf)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"