Ocean Habitats

The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States. About half of the Bay’s water volume comes from salt water from the Atlantic Ocean. The other half drains into the Bay from its enormous 64,000-square-mile watershed. Estuaries are among the most productive environments on earth, creating more organic matter each year than similarly-sized forests and agricultural areas. Estuaries also provide diverse habitats for wildlife and aquatic life, protect our communities against flooding, reduce pollution of waterways, and support local economies through commercial and recreational activities. Thousands of species

Coral reefs are the most biodiverse ecosystem on the planet. There are more than 25,000 known species of organisms and countless others that have yet to be identified (Helvarg, 2000). Reefs thrive on the shallow edge of tropical seas, most often on the eastern edge of continents along warm water currents that brush the coasts. Reefs cannot live in cold waters and are limited by ocean depth and available sunlight. Coral is the foundation of the reef community, providing a three-dimensional structure where thousands of species of vertebrates and invertebrates live and feed. Some species of coral are hard, while others soft. Some are branched, yet others are compact and rounded. Coral is made up of large

An estuary system is “the resulting collisions of sweet and salt-fresh river water flowing seaward and ocean water inland.” It is an aquatic system where salt and freshwater are constantly mixing. An estuary system is one of most active systems of the planet; it is a hybrid system that contains the best and worst qualities of the ocean, river, and lake systems it conglomerates. Estuaries are unique in nature because of their ability to be the most productive ecosystem on the entire planet; humans have attempted and failed to reach the productivity that estuaries naturally grant. There productivity lies it the constant change that occurs from the conflicting flows of fresh and ocean water. Ocean and freshwater are measured largely based on salinity, or the level of parts of salt per thousand. Ocean water usually

The topography of the island is also of note. The west end of the island features a closed-canopy forest with more hardwood trees. The east end of the island is better characterized as a “boreal forest,” a term used to describe regions that are mostly covered by coniferous forests. It is good to note that the balsam fir is found on both ends of the island, but that samples used in the study from the west end of the island were, on average, older, but shorter, than those samples found on the east side of the island.

Habitat: Commonly found in terrestrial. Forest light gaps, slips, margins, disturbed sites, open habitats, riverbeds, cliffs, inshore and offshore islands, fernland, herbfield,

Oyster reefs, giant populations of oysters, provide habitats for many other types of organisms such as worms, snails, sea squirts, sponges, small crabs, and fishes.

Kelp forests are seen as the ultimate ecological engineer in coastal areas. They exist in marine environments spanning in southern California, Aleutian Islands, and the western north Atlantic. Light, latitude, and water temperature and nutrients all play a role in facilitating the growth of kelp forests all around the world, (Bolton). Kelp specifically dominates the shallow rocky coasts of the world‘s cold water marine habitats. Although they look as a free-growing plant, they are in fact primarily of brown algae. These structures provide food and shelter to a huge mix of biota, including crabs, sea urchins, mollusks, and other marine organisms (Steneck). The fronds, or large leaves of the kelp are the distinctive feature that can represent where a specific kelp may be found. The sizes of these organisms can range from the smallest found near California and Alaska at 5m to giant kelp up to 45m in length found on the west coasts of North and South America (Hamilton).

An estuary system is “the resulting collisions of sweet and salt-fresh river water flowing seaward and ocean water inland.” It is an aquatic system where salt and freshwater are constantly mixing. An estuary system is one of most active systems of the planet; it is a hybrid system that contains the best and worst qualities of the ocean, river, and lake systems it conglomerates. Estuaries are unique in nature because of their ability to be the most productive ecosystem on the entire planet; humans have attempted and failed to reach the productivity that estuaries naturally grant. There productivity lies it the constant change that occurs from the conflicting flows of fresh and ocean water. Ocean and freshwater are measured largely based on salinity, or the level of parts of salt per thousand. Ocean water usually has around 35 parts per thousands of salt water, while freshwater

Estuaries are known for being sensitive to several human activities, such as littering and building structures like dams and seawalls that affect their natural flow of freshwater. As estuaries can prevent nearby streets from flooding, they will consequently bring many of their contaminates as well (Baker), which can pose a serious issue for an estuary’s productivity and health. UFL geologist John M. Jager argues that “toxic substances and excess nutrients [from such human-made factors] contribute to fish diseases, algal blooms, and low dissolved oxygen,” all being a threat to the health of not only the estuary itself, but additionally that of its wildlife and even humans themselves.

Leafy Sea Dragons live only in the waters of south and east Australia. It would be weird if everyone had to live in one area? It would be cramped!

Rocky Shores are found where the sea meets the land which supports a diverse mix of plants and animals that have adapted to survive in the unique conditions of constant wave action as well as the fall of tides (Ehp.qld. 2016). Most of the ecosystems flora and fauna live in the intertidal zone, between high and low tide (Ehp.qld. 2016). They are exposed to two environments, being crushed by waves and swamped by the sea water, extreme temperatures and salinity, and left unprotected

Nature of change refers to the natural or human induced change towards an ecosystem. Humans play a role in maintaining or disturbing the dynamic equilibrium of any ecosystem. They have the ability to minimise natural resources ecosystems in order to grow food, build habitats, and remove or extract specific

Kelp forests are “a source of food and habitat for dozens of other coastal species” (qtd. in Soulé et al 1240). Therefore, to maintain the diversity and richness of the coastal marine ecology, kelp forests should be preserved.

The intertidal rocky shore of Caloundra Beach is inhabited by diverse range of biodiversity of animals and plants, many of which have developed high levels of adaptations throughout their existence. The very boundary of marine and terrestrial ecosystem, this environment is subjected to extremes of the physical environment such as temperature, desiccation, wave turbulence as well the ecological interactions that commonly occur in biotic communities (e.g. competition, predation). However Rocky intertidal shores are easily accessible by humans and provide an enjoyable opportunity for passive recreation and for science and environmental education as well.

On the 9th of March, I went to Siren’s Rocks to investigate the community pattern, also called zonation, within the bounds of Island Bay’s Wellington Ecological Marine Reserve. The ecosystem of Taputeranga Marine Reserve takes the full impact of the Southern ocean swells. This Reserve is influenced by three different oceanic currents. This is an abiotic factor. The currents impact helps shape the rocky shoreline into the ecological community of different species of shore life into a pattern of different zones (zonation).