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July 13, 2007: Jug Bay Site Visit to Check the Status of the Underwater Grasses

Peter Bergstrom (NOAA), Candace Morrell (MD CB-NERRS), Alison Hammer (NOAA) and Kevin Arvai (NOAA intern) returned to survey the wild celery at the spot in Jug Bay where we planted wild celery on 6/12/07, as part of the the "NOAA Restoration Day." See map of our route.

We found lots of hydrilla (Hv) and a bit of coontail (Cd), plus a bit of the wild celery (Va) that we had planted in June. We heard from Greg Kearns (Patuxent River Park) that he saw about 6 clumps of wild celery surviving there (one "substantial") on 7/3/07, and we were pleased to find that some of it was still there, probably the "substantial" patch.

Hydrilla has a way of smothering other planted species, and hydrilla seems to be increasing in that part of the Patuxent. We found what appeared to be one or two cat litter size pans of wild celery that had survived (see photo with the plants marked). We suspect that this was from one of the batches with longer shoots at planting time; many of the pans had only short shoots when planted. Otherwise the shallows in the area were full of dense hydrilla (Hv) with bits of coontail (Cd). The wild rice that Greg and others have transplanted near Jug Bay was in bloom, see wild rice photo.

• This summary can also be seen on-line at VIMS: http://www.vims.edu/bio/sav/2007obs.html#noaa071307
  
  
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