Right off our 6:30 am ferry from Vancouver, we headed to the Grand Hotel in Nanaimo. We figured we were early, but well before the 9am start, the conference room was already filled with posters of various projects and 60 energized marine enthusiasts.
The conference began with Brian Riddal (Pacific Salmon Foundation Chair) giving an overview of the Pacific Salmon Foundation and its efforts to restore the Salish Sea to its former glory through research, monitoring, and community initiatives. Through collaboration with groups such as the UBC fisheries centre they hope to learn more about seal predation on salmon, juvenile salmonid survival, and near shore habitat’s importance to juvenile salmon.
There were many interesting talks to follow such as the Strait of Georgia Data Centre (SGDC), an initiative sponsored by the Beaty family and PCF. The SGDC is an effort to consolidate data from a variety of sources in near shore habitats. We even noticed that UBC students were working on the project!
We were able to connect with students from UVIC and SFU working on eelgrass projects as well, it was great to hear about what others are doing and open up the opportunity to share knowledge.
Grass roots stewardship initiatives were a big component of the conference. We had no idea that so many communities have been involved in collecting data and mapping for over 20 years. It was great to see passion that these representatives had for their local ecosystems and their protection. They were very eager to share knowledge and offer us opportunities to work in their local systems.
A little disheartening was learning about the challenges facing kelp and eelgrass restoration, and the rate that this vegetation is disappearing from our coastline. Kelp and eelgrass mapping are an important part of understanding how BC’s coastal habitat is changing over time. Hardened beaches, hard coast lines, and deteriorating spawning habitat were very interesting to learn about and it will be interesting to see the progress that these groups will make and hopefully we can collaborate with them in the future.
Eelgrass wasting disease was also discussed. In the late 20’s the eastern coast of North America lost 90% of its eelgrass meadows to the wasting disease. Cynthia Durance gave a very interesting talk about how the wasting disease has recently been recorded in Washington and sampling protocol for its detection was shared with the group. Hopefully we can avoid an outbreak here in BC but it will be essential to keep monitoring beds to keep track of the disease’s presence.
Besides hearing from a variety of amazing groups doing all sorts of conservation work along the BC and Washington coast, we participated in a number of productive facilitated discussions. The most important research goals identified by a group vote were to standardize sampling protocols so data is comparable, to centralize all available data so it is accessible to researchers and not lost, and to make identifying ecosystem services a priority. Many of these groups (including the O’Connor Lab!) heard about each other’s work for the first time and so we decided that staying in touch and keeping up with each other’s progress should be our top priority. To facilitate this, The Pacific Salmon Foundation generously agreed to attach to the Strait of Georgia Data Sharing Center a webpage where all groups working in the near shore can post profiles and contact information. Michelle Fireriverheart of Help the Kelp of Gabriola Island also kindly stepped up to the plate and will put together an ongoing newsletter so we can get updates on everyone’s progress!
Coreen and I also gave a talk about the O’Connor Lab and our new initiative: Project Zostera. Coreen did an amazing job summarizing the lab’s work in eelgrass to date and our future directions for research and collaboration opportunities. I talked about my plans to study eelgrass algal epiphytes for my honours thesis. The whole room cheered when Coreen said that it was the “O’Connor Lab’s coming out party.” Nikki Wright the symposium organiser mentioned to the group that she was thrilled to connect with an eelgrass lab that she had previously not known about.
This was our first conference representing Project Zostera and it could not have gone better. We were overwhelmed with the amount of interest in research that we saw from this group of inspiring scientists, conservation officers, government representatives, organization executives, and volunteers. Thanks to this symposium we have become a part of this community of people with a keen interest in eelgrass. It was an amazing experience to see so many grassroots organizations, government officials and researchers come together and make real progress. Hopefully this will lead us to more efficient and effective research as we connect to the eelgrass work that these groups have been doing. This symposium was the beginning of Project Zostera’s efforts to incorporate local knowledge into its research initiatives. This will help us form better research questions and hypotheses and offer these groups analytical insights into the habitat they love.
-Gwen Griffiths
The conference began with Brian Riddal (Pacific Salmon Foundation Chair) giving an overview of the Pacific Salmon Foundation and its efforts to restore the Salish Sea to its former glory through research, monitoring, and community initiatives. Through collaboration with groups such as the UBC fisheries centre they hope to learn more about seal predation on salmon, juvenile salmonid survival, and near shore habitat’s importance to juvenile salmon.
There were many interesting talks to follow such as the Strait of Georgia Data Centre (SGDC), an initiative sponsored by the Beaty family and PCF. The SGDC is an effort to consolidate data from a variety of sources in near shore habitats. We even noticed that UBC students were working on the project!
We were able to connect with students from UVIC and SFU working on eelgrass projects as well, it was great to hear about what others are doing and open up the opportunity to share knowledge.
Grass roots stewardship initiatives were a big component of the conference. We had no idea that so many communities have been involved in collecting data and mapping for over 20 years. It was great to see passion that these representatives had for their local ecosystems and their protection. They were very eager to share knowledge and offer us opportunities to work in their local systems.
A little disheartening was learning about the challenges facing kelp and eelgrass restoration, and the rate that this vegetation is disappearing from our coastline. Kelp and eelgrass mapping are an important part of understanding how BC’s coastal habitat is changing over time. Hardened beaches, hard coast lines, and deteriorating spawning habitat were very interesting to learn about and it will be interesting to see the progress that these groups will make and hopefully we can collaborate with them in the future.
Eelgrass wasting disease was also discussed. In the late 20’s the eastern coast of North America lost 90% of its eelgrass meadows to the wasting disease. Cynthia Durance gave a very interesting talk about how the wasting disease has recently been recorded in Washington and sampling protocol for its detection was shared with the group. Hopefully we can avoid an outbreak here in BC but it will be essential to keep monitoring beds to keep track of the disease’s presence.
Besides hearing from a variety of amazing groups doing all sorts of conservation work along the BC and Washington coast, we participated in a number of productive facilitated discussions. The most important research goals identified by a group vote were to standardize sampling protocols so data is comparable, to centralize all available data so it is accessible to researchers and not lost, and to make identifying ecosystem services a priority. Many of these groups (including the O’Connor Lab!) heard about each other’s work for the first time and so we decided that staying in touch and keeping up with each other’s progress should be our top priority. To facilitate this, The Pacific Salmon Foundation generously agreed to attach to the Strait of Georgia Data Sharing Center a webpage where all groups working in the near shore can post profiles and contact information. Michelle Fireriverheart of Help the Kelp of Gabriola Island also kindly stepped up to the plate and will put together an ongoing newsletter so we can get updates on everyone’s progress!
Coreen and I also gave a talk about the O’Connor Lab and our new initiative: Project Zostera. Coreen did an amazing job summarizing the lab’s work in eelgrass to date and our future directions for research and collaboration opportunities. I talked about my plans to study eelgrass algal epiphytes for my honours thesis. The whole room cheered when Coreen said that it was the “O’Connor Lab’s coming out party.” Nikki Wright the symposium organiser mentioned to the group that she was thrilled to connect with an eelgrass lab that she had previously not known about.
This was our first conference representing Project Zostera and it could not have gone better. We were overwhelmed with the amount of interest in research that we saw from this group of inspiring scientists, conservation officers, government representatives, organization executives, and volunteers. Thanks to this symposium we have become a part of this community of people with a keen interest in eelgrass. It was an amazing experience to see so many grassroots organizations, government officials and researchers come together and make real progress. Hopefully this will lead us to more efficient and effective research as we connect to the eelgrass work that these groups have been doing. This symposium was the beginning of Project Zostera’s efforts to incorporate local knowledge into its research initiatives. This will help us form better research questions and hypotheses and offer these groups analytical insights into the habitat they love.
-Gwen Griffiths