California is blessed with an 1,100-mile shoreline. Earlier than the trendy period, it supported an immense community of coastal estuaries. Their underwater seagrass meadows have been nurseries for fish and different marine life and necessary refueling stops for migratory birds. Offshore, dense kelp forests have been equally productive houses for wildlife. Each estuaries and kelp forests benefitted from the important thing position performed by sea otters — the highest predator that helped them thrive.
Right this moment, greater than 90% of our wetlands are gone, misplaced to urbanization, coastal improvement, air pollution and runoff of smothering sediments. However wetlands and kelp forests could make a comeback. And, as state leaders now acknowledge, in addition they can function the very important first line of protection for susceptible coastal communities that should adapt to rising sea ranges from accelerating local weather change.
Wholesome coastal ecosystems can do even extra — a truth integrated into a brand new state blueprint that expands the position of nature-based options to handle the impacts of local weather change. California plans to make the most of a few of nature’s finest instruments to battle local weather change, particularly by drawing on the facility of the state’s underwater eelgrass meadows to seize and retailer carbon.
Prioritizing conservation and restoration of coastal wetlands which can be dwelling to this often-overlooked marine plant can accomplish that many issues. It could assist us take care of greenhouse gasses, assist defend coastal communities, improve fish habitat and improve the biodiversity that retains the dwelling ocean resilient in a time of fast international change.
California’s imaginative and prescient for utilizing dwelling coastal habitats to assist obtain our local weather targets is written into the brand new Pure and Working Lands Local weather Good Technique, unveiled final yr and now being ready for launch. Though eelgrass meadows have a comparatively small footprint alongside our coast, they will play an outsized position in delivering on a extra climate-resilient future.
Consider it as a triple win.
Eelgrass and different ocean crops can seize and sequester extra carbon per acre than terrestrial crops and forests, storing it so it doesn’t contribute to warming the environment. By eradicating carbon dioxide from the water by photosynthesis, eelgrass acts as a buffer in opposition to climate-driven ocean acidification. Eelgrass beds present important habitat for forage fish and salmon, feed myriad migratory birds and assist defend the shorelines the place we dwell, work and play by lowering the facility of storm surges.
Although eelgrass beds and coastal wetlands have shrunk dramatically, there’s new vitality — and new science — supporting restoration of those very important ecosystems.
Wildlife is a crucial ally in eelgrass restoration. Scientists have lengthy recognized that the genetic variety of eelgrass — and due to this fact its resiliency — will increase in estuaries the place sea otters are current. Furthermore, research in Monterey Bay’s Elkhorn Slough discovered that as the ocean otter inhabitants rose, eelgrass beds flourished. At Monterey Bay Aquarium, we’re working with companions to duplicate that success in Morro Bay, utilizing our exhibit otters as surrogate moms to boost rescued pups for return to the wild. Sooner or later, returning sea otters to extra of their historic vary might assist eelgrass flourish in additional of California’s remaining estuaries, making these ecosystems extra vibrant within the course of.
None of this can occur with out an lively dedication to include nature-based options into our local weather technique. Time is of the essence, as rising droughts and wildfires display. Eelgrass meadows have suffered intensive losses from sedimentation — tied to erosive land-use practices, in addition to air pollution, dredging and the development of docks and different shoreline buildings. Morro Bay alone has misplaced over 90% of its eelgrass since 2007.
I applaud the California Pure Assets Company for its farsighted choice to include the state’s eelgrass beds, coastal wetlands and different nature-based options in its preparations for sea-level rise, extra intense storm surges, ocean acidification and different issues led to by local weather change.
Shifting ahead, one of the best ways to place underwater eelgrass meadows and different coastal habitats to work for us is to guard what we now have left and restore what we’ve misplaced — together with by enlisting the assistance of sea otters. Robust California state insurance policies for wetland safety and restoration will probably be important to our success.
By making nature our ally, we are able to obtain a carbon-neutral future and the triple win that coastal habitats ship on daily basis: carbon sequestration, thriving fish and wildlife populations and extra resilient coastal communities.
Julie Packard is govt director of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.