Lower Laguna Madre
Texas OneGulf Center of Excellence, (Breier, Hicks, Pulich, DeYoe), LLM-PEM: Developing a Predictive Ecological Model for the Lower Laguna Madre: Forecasting Ecosystem Shifts and Changes in Key Ecological Indicators
The Lower Laguna Madre alone is one of the largest embayments in Texas. Though highly productive and relatively healthy the Lower Laguna Madre is changing. In particular its extensive seagrass beds, the largest in the State, have undergone a steady decline in percent cover for decades. Seagrass community composition has been changing as well. Multiple human-induced and natural factors appear to contribute to this decline. It is tempting to make connections between these changes, the general process of eutrophication, and the specific problems of nutrient loading and low dissolved oxygen within the system. But to date, the complexity and size of the system and the limited availability of synoptic data makes it difficult to establish conclusive links between these processes. These trends are likely to continue and may accelerate as a result of near future changes in climate, land use, and water use. Thus, there is an increasing need to understand the basis for systemic ecological change in the Lower Laguna Madre. The goal of this new project is to develop a quantitative ecological model specific to water column and benthic primary production in the Lower Laguna Madre. Ultimately, this ecological model will be formulated so that it can be coupled with a hydrodynamic hydrologic model that can resolve the complex physical forcings and flows within the system. In this phase I study, we will develop and validate such an ecological model and use it to predict trends in primary production over the course of the next decade. This project is a partnership between The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (Breier, Hicks, and DeYoe) and Texas State University (Pulich).
CHIP BREIER: GEOCHEMISTRY & ENVIRONMENTAL ROBOTICS