Updates from the Field: Monitoring Eelgrass Expansion

Makenzie, Monitoring Coordinator, takes data while monitoring eelgrass in Morro Bay.

The Morro Bay National Estuary Program’s fieldwork has been deemed an essential service by the County of San Luis Obispo. Due to COVID-19 safety precautions, we are not working with volunteers at this time and our field staff are following updated monitoring protocols. We look forward to working with volunteers and other community members again as soon as it is safe for us to do so. Thank you, readers, for staying engaged and supporting the Estuary Program’s work on monitoring eelgrass expansion and other projects during this difficult time. Green, green, everywhere! If you’ve been out on the …

Field Updates February 2020: Creek and Eelgrass

March 6, 2020 Posted by Morro Bay National Estuary Program cal poly research eelgrass eelgrass restoration environmental restoration field work fieldwork MBNEP morro bay morro bay estuary morro bay national estuary program seagrass Tenera environmental Blog Posts

Creek Water Quality February was a month marked with warm temperatures and low precipitation here in the Morro Bay watershed. In February 2019, the San Luis Obispo CIMIS rain gauge received 7.48 inches of rain, with 57% of days during the month recording rainfall. Comparatively, this year’s rainfall has been much lower, with a February monthly total of 0.01 inches of rain and only one day with rainfall as of February 28. Low precipitation levels have led to low flows in our creeks, as can be seen in this picture of Dairy Creek, a tributary of Chorro Creek. The amount …

Field Updates January 2020: Eelgrass Success and Creek Water Quality

February 14, 2020 Posted by Morro Bay National Estuary Program creek stage creek water quality eelgrass eelgrass loss eelgrass plots eelgrass restoration MBNEP monitoring morro bay morro bay national estuary program morro bay watershed restoration Blog Posts Field Updates

This month, our field staff have been busy monitoring eelgrass success in the bay and water quality in the creeks that drain to the Morro Bay estuary. Eelgrass monitoring and restoration success If you spent time out on the bay in January, you might have noticed the really high tides. January 2020 had King Tides, meaning that the high tides were much higher than normal. These extreme high tides are mirrored by extreme low tides. We always take advantage of these extreme low tides to monitor eelgrass, as we have a wider window than normal to conduct our monitoring. Eelgrass …

Field Updates, October 2019: Eelgrass Mapping, Ground-truthing, and Cal Poly Partnerships

November 8, 2019 Posted by Morro Bay National Estuary Program cal poly CalPoly eelgrass eelgrass loss eelgrass map eelgrass restoration estuary program field update fieldwork mapping MBNEP monitoring morro bay multispectral imaging restoration seagrass volunteer Field Updates

Eelgrass fieldwork depends on tides Fall is a busy eelgrass season for field staff at the Estuary Program. The exact timing of our field work depends on when the good low-tides occur, which varies slightly from year to year. This year, October had a few days that had tides low enough to expose the eelgrass during daylight hours. This doesn’t always happen—sometimes the low tides we need happen after sundown and before sunrise. We were glad to see good tides in combination with good timing because we have a few different projects going on. Monitoring permanent eelgrass plots First …

Field Updates February 2019: Wet weather, eelgrass restoration, and creek monitoring

March 1, 2019 Posted by Morro Bay National Estuary Program creek stage eelgrass eelgrass restoration eelgrass transplant estuary ISCO sampler MBNEP morro bay morro bay national estuary program Morro Bay rain totals sediment SLO rain totals stage height stream gage stream stage Watershed Stewards Program wet weather SLO Blog Posts Field Updates

A picture from the bridge at our monitoring site on Canet Road, overlooking Chorro Creek. What a difference a week and some good rain storms will do!

Fulfilling our mission to protect and restore the Morro Bay estuary for people and wildlife requires a lot of hard work in the field. At the Estuary Program, that often entails doing research, restoration, and monitoring work out on the estuary and along the creeks that feed into it. Read on to see what we’ve been up to during the past month during this wet weather. Eelgrass February eelgrass restoration details This past month, we have been busy taking advantage of some of the year’s lowest tides to replant eelgrass throughout the estuary. The weather didn’t want to …

Field Updates November 2018: Eelgrass Monitoring and Rainfall Totals

December 7, 2018 Posted by Morro Bay National Estuary Program eelgrass eelgrass loss eelgrass restoration estuary field updates field work fieldwork MBNEP monitoring morro bay natural recruitment precipitation rainfall rainfall totals citizen science Field Updates

Fulfilling our mission to protect and restore the Morro Bay estuary for people and wildlife requires a lot of hard work in the field. At the Estuary Program, that often entails doing research, restoration, and monitoring work out on the estuary and along the creeks that feed into it. Read on to see what we’ve been up to during the past month. Eelgrass Monitoring In November, we went out and checked on all of our 2018 eelgrass restoration plots, as well as some planted in 2017. While we were out monitoring, we noticed lots of new patches of …

Field Updates October 2017: Eelgrass Seed Planting

November 10, 2017 Posted by Morro Bay National Estuary Program eelgrass eelgrass restoration estuary morro bay morro bay national estuary program research science seed Blog Posts

Though all these seeds came from the same eelgrass bed on North Sandspit, there was lots of variation in size and color. You can see the ribs in the goat in some of the seeds.

Protecting and restoring the bay and estuary takes a lot of boots on the ground…as well as the occasional wet suit. See what our volunteers and field staff have been working on during the past month. Eelgrass The highlight of fieldwork in October was collecting our final blades of flowering eelgrass and planting the seeds. We learned a lot about flowering patterns throughout the bay. The beds varied in the magnitude, stages, and progression of seed development. Some beds had too few shoots to collect from, while others were plentiful in comparison. Eelgrass seeds are small and …

Field Updates September 2017: Pikeminnow and Eelgrass

October 6, 2017 Posted by Morro Bay National Estuary Program cal poly california conservation corps eelgrass eelgrass restoration eelgrass seed estuary program field work fieldwork invasive removal morro bay pikeminnow Stillwater Science Blog Posts

Collected seeds are held in mesh bags in the estuary until they mature. Mature seeds will have a hard, longitudinally ribbed coat and can vary in color, including olive, dark brown and black.

Protecting and restoring the bay and estuary takes a lot of boots on the ground. See what our volunteers and field staff have been working on during the past month. Pikeminnow Management Chorro Creek used to be home to a healthy population of steelhead trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss), however their numbers have declined. While there are multiple factors that contribute to this, a fish called the Sacramento pikeminnow (Ptychocheilus grandis) put pressure on steelhead. Pikeminnow eat juvenile steelhead and compete with steelhead for food and habitat. While native to other parts of California, pikeminnow are not native to the Morro …