Seagrass again

[dgadee]

The Guardian reports that 90% of seagrass has been lost: 'Catastrophic': UK has lost 90% of seagrass meadows, study finds

The reasoning seems to be that there are lots of areas where it could be but isn't, so it must have been lost. A similar - but bit more spurious I have to admit - argument is that there are no elephants in the UK, so they too must have been lost.

 

[chriss999]

Funnily enough, there were elephants and they have been lost.
BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Mammoths survived late in Britain

 

[dgadee]

Funnily enough, there were elephants and they have been lost.
BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Mammoths survived late in Britain

Yes, 14,000 years ago I see,

 

[Stemar]

Maybe that's when the seagrass was in those places too. It certainly seems to be thriving in Studland Bay, in spite of the best efforts of those wicked boaters to rip it out with their anchors

 

[Concerto]

Oh, I do wish the reporter read the beginning of the article. The first paragraph from the report reads:

"The spatial extent of seagrass is poorly mapped, and knowledge of historical loss is limited. Here, we collated empirical and qualitative data using systematic review methods to provide unique analysis on seagrass occurrence and loss in the United Kingdom. We document 8,493 ha of recently mapped seagrass in the United Kingdom since 1998. This equates to an estimated 0.9 Mt of carbon, which, in the current carbon market represents about £22 million. Using simple models to estimate seagrass declines triangulated against habitat suitability models, we provide evidence of catastrophic seagrass loss; at least 44% of United Kingdom’s seagrasses have been lost since 1936, 39% since the 1980’s. However, losses over longer time spans may be as high as 92%. Based on these estimates, historical seagrass meadows could have stored 11.5 Mt of carbon and supported approximately 400 million fish. Our results demonstrate the vast scale of losses and highlight the opportunities to restore seagrass to support a range of ecosystems services. " Historical Analysis Exposes Catastrophic Seagrass Loss for the United Kingdom

These "scientists" have decide to become the experts on seagrass as it has not been studied before, similar to the study of cute seahorses no doubt. This 92% loss is pure guesswork. Later in Guardian article "Seagrass covers about 0.1% of the ocean globally ". So I have to discount the estimates of what was there before any measurements were taken. In a similar vein I was fighting a local park from using goats to recreate some chalk grazing. They produced evidence of how the "traditional" grazing was being lost compared to records going back into the Victorian period and how this had acelerated since 1945. Unfortunately, they omitted the description of the area given by Chaucer in Canterbury Tales, which clearly stated the whole area was woodland and forest. So all of the fields and grazing areas had been cleared by man and in their blinkered scientific research wanted to protect man's clearance of the land. The end result was a curt "We are using the goats and nothing is going to stop us". I did meet the person I was communicating with about 6 months later and they had to admit I was right and could not argue against the evidence, but their local "scientists" had obtained Heritage Lottery funding for their pet project and nothing was going to stop them.

What is far better documented is the massive loss of fish from our oceans. Reports from sailors and fishermen going back centuries talk of the wholesale decline of fish catches. Over fishing and pollution was the start. The current massive trawlers using electronic technology along with massive nets to catch as much as possible does not help. Then the crazy EU fisheries policy of quotas and once reached to throw back dead fish in the sea, surely the simpler way would have been to change the size of the holes in the nets to allow smaller fish to escape. Man has been slowly filling the oceans and no doubt us wicked boating people are to blame with our antifouling paint. Funny how the marine industry can still use TBT antifouling and regular boaters are banned.

 

[dunedin]

The Guardian reports that 90% of seagrass has been lost: 'Catastrophic': UK has lost 90% of seagrass meadows, study finds

The reasoning seems to be that there are lots of areas where it could be but isn't, so it must have been lost. A similar - but bit more spurious I have to admit - argument is that there are no elephants in the UK, so they too must have been lost.

Interesting that one of the two ares of seagrass reported as holding up best is ........... Studland Bay!

Maybe we should recommend anchoring as good practice, like ploughing on land, to promote seagrass

I’ll get my coat ........................

 

[lustyd]

Interesting that they're concentrating on the carbon. I read a study a while ago which suggested that despite capturing carbon, rainforests and other areas of vegetation had a net harmful effect on climate due to the methane when the various things rot. If that's the case then the same would apply here and anchoring would be a very ecofriendly thing to do.

I'm all for being green, but we can't keep working towards banning everything that touches nature without addressing the real issue of overpopulation. When there were fewer people the planet was better able to recover from our activity. We need to choose between continued population growth but in indoors isolation, and population decline and a return to enjoying the planet. Of course, we could also offer everyone a choice between having kids and going outside...

 

[Concerto]

Looking at the study in a bit more detail, I see many references to studies in the introduction and virtually all of them are from 2000 or later. The earliest reference is a study conducted in August to October in 1933. The associated map is titled "Figure 1. Butcher’s 1930s estimate of seagrass area cover ". Note the word estimate, not survey.
https://www.frontiersin.org/files/A...29962-HTML-r1/image_m/fpls-12-629962-g001.jpg
Following the link provided to the original document, you can only see the first page as you have to have an Oxford Academic account. If this document is so critical to the study, why is this not available to all to read?

 

[dgadee]

If this document is so critical to the study, why is this not available to all to read?

Because scientific publishers make a fortune out of academic institutions. They get the research for free but then charge for access. The system is changing slowly (the research councils are starting to demand it) but academics are their worst enemies, seeing open access journals as having less status than paid for journals.

But law was like that, too, until bailii.org came along and the punter could see what the judges were saying.

 

[oldharry]

Yes this is a favourite bit of deception by Conservos , as opposed to Conservationists! It WAS lost - in the early 1930's by a disease which killed off almost the entire European Seagrass stock. It had NOTHING to do with post war human activity. There is little or no clear data on the true extent of the loss in 1930's, so the claimed 92% is largely guesswork. (Edit: See Concertos post above) Another example of 'expert opinion' on which so many NE recommendations are based? Yet it is consistently presented in this way.

It seems to me that Conservation is doomed if they simply hold meetings about what ought to have happened, instead of going to look and quantify what is actually there.

Secondly there is clear evidence that recovery in anchorages is not significantly different to areas without anchoring. (Seastar Survey, Studland, 2012 - the only actual survey of the Bay ever undertaken. It was howled down because it did not confirm 'expert opinion')

Thirdly, who is actually measuring eelgrass extent nationally? Answer NOBODY. A number of the more significant beds are being monitored, but incredibly we discovered just last week that the Charts used by Natural England and passed to MMO for the Studland Eelgrass are not correct! We overlaid aerial photos of the Bay showing the eelgrass over the official map, and found it significantly different. This is quite worrying as the official map is the basis for any proposed NAZ's.

It would also seem that nobody has actually bothered to go and find out where and how much of eelgrass there actually is - in spit of all the years of fuss!

Thankfully MMO yesterday invited me to join their Management planning meetings, so we will be fully part of the next stage of detailed management Planning.

 

[Boathook]

Yes this is a favourite bit of deception by Conservos , as opposed to Conservationists! It WAS lost - in the early 1930's by a disease which killed off almost the entire European Seagrass stock. It had NOTHING to do with post war human activity. There is little or no clear data on the true extent of the loss in 1930's, so the claimed 92% is largely guesswork. (Edit: See Concertos post above) Another example of 'expert opinion' on which so many NE recommendations are based? Yet it is consistently presented in this way.

It seems to me that Conservation is doomed if they simply hold meetings about what ought to have happened, instead of going to look and quantify what is actually there.

Secondly there is clear evidence that recovery in anchorages is not significantly different to areas without anchoring. (Seastar Survey, Studland, 2012 - the only actual survey of the Bay ever undertaken. It was howled down because it did not confirm 'expert opinion')

Thirdly, who is actually measuring eelgrass extent nationally? Answer NOBODY. A number of the more significant beds are being monitored, but incredibly we discovered just last week that the Charts used by Natural England and passed to MMO for the Studland Eelgrass are not correct! We overlaid aerial photos of the Bay showing the eelgrass over the official map, and found it significantly different. This is quite worrying as the official map is the basis for any proposed NAZ's.

It would also seem that nobody has actually bothered to go and find out where and how much of eelgrass there actually is - in spit of all the years of fuss!

Thankfully MMO yesterday invited me to join their Management planning meetings, so we will be fully part of the next stage of detailed management Planning.

Thanks oldharry (and others) for doing all this for us.

 

[Concerto]

Yes this is a favourite bit of deception by Conservos , as opposed to Conservationists! It WAS lost - in the early 1930's by a disease which killed off almost the entire European Seagrass stock. It had NOTHING to do with post war human activity. There is little or no clear data on the true extent of the loss in 1930's, so the claimed 92% is largely guesswork. (Edit: See Concertos post above) Another example of 'expert opinion' on which so many NE recommendations are based? Yet it is consistently presented in this way.

It seems to me that Conservation is doomed if they simply hold meetings about what ought to have happened, instead of going to look and quantify what is actually there.

Secondly there is clear evidence that recovery in anchorages is not significantly different to areas without anchoring. (Seastar Survey, Studland, 2012 - the only actual survey of the Bay ever undertaken. It was howled down because it did not confirm 'expert opinion')

Thirdly, who is actually measuring eelgrass extent nationally? Answer NOBODY. A number of the more significant beds are being monitored, but incredibly we discovered just last week that the Charts used by Natural England and passed to MMO for the Studland Eelgrass are not correct! We overlaid aerial photos of the Bay showing the eelgrass over the official map, and found it significantly different. This is quite worrying as the official map is the basis for any proposed NAZ's.

It would also seem that nobody has actually bothered to go and find out where and how much of eelgrass there actually is - in spit of all the years of fuss!

Thankfully MMO yesterday invited me to join their Management planning meetings, so we will be fully part of the next stage of detailed management Planning.

So the disease in the 1930's was the cause of the loss of almost the entire European Seagrass. That makes sense as the Burns study in the early 1930's was started in response to the disease and why there is no study before it. If you know about this, why did the those writing this "scientific" report not mention it?

It is worrying that the charts NE and MMO are so inaccurate. If you have aerial photos of one area, why are these "learned" people not using all of the information that is available?

Lets hope your participation in the MMO meetings helps sort fact from fiction.

 

[Daydream believer]

. Of course, we could also offer everyone a choice between having kids and going outside...

Never had a bonk in the park then?

 

[oldharry]

So the disease in the 1930's was the cause of the loss of almost the entire European Seagrass. That makes sense as the Burns study in the early 1930's was started in response to the disease and why there is no study before it. If you know about this, why did the those writing this "scientific" report not mention it?

It is worrying that the charts NE and MMO are so inaccurate. If you have aerial photos of one area, why are these "learned" people not using all of the information that is available?

Lets hope your participation in the MMO meetings helps sort fact from fiction.

Good questions, which I have spent the last 10 years trying to get 'them' to answer! Dont be too hard on the MMO: They are the Gov organisation tasked with managing the MCZs. They have not done the 'research' (i.e discussions 100 miles inland), which was supposed to have been dne ny Natural England. The fact they are actively listening to people like me and BORG suggests they are more aware of the NE Political agendas than they can admit to, and are making an honest effort to get it right. But the political pressures behind conservationism are intense and can be very vocal, and it will not be easy for them to remain objective.

Those of you who have followed the saga will remember the vitriolic attacks on us in the press and media by the likes of Packham some years ago, which have resulted ina public perception that we boaters are anti - conservation, and pursuing our own pleasure regardless of the 'damage' our saily boats do! Couple that with the utter refusal by the 'experts' to accept any information or data that has not come from approved sources, then it is very easy to maintain an otherwise untenable supposition.

Sorting fact from fiction is not as easy as it sounds: because there is little recent data, 'expert opinion' is widely deployed. This says this is what ought to have happened, therfore it has. We know how the eelgrass has spread across the Bay, but because that info does not come from an approved source, it is rejected as 'anecdotal' . We have a body of 1st hand observation by people who live and worked for a lifetime by the Bay. It paints a very doifferent picture and refutes entirle the current NE claims. It was firmly rejected at a meeting with the Science Advisory Committee, because it did not contain dates and times, and was therefore unverifiable. This means there are no established benchmarks to evaluate what is happening.

So as an example: our reports demonstrate that seahorses may stay away from the bay for several years at a time (so no 'colony' present) However that is not admitted, so when Garrick Maidment says they have 'disappeared', this is a 'new observation'. with an obvious causality - the boats! It also conveniently omits the fact that in the years leading up to his 'bonanza' year in 2008, boating was also in boom time thanks to a succession of reasonably good summers.

So its not a simple task....! In any case professional pride and reputations may be damaged if our representations are accepted over those of the 'experts'!

 

[Jungle Jim]

I heard the program on radio 4 today and caught the '90% of seagrass has gone' at the start then at the end a marine biologist researcher admitting that nobody knew where most of the seagrass areas are around the UK. I was shouting at the radio at that point.