New tool measures intensity of human activities affecting seagrass | CBC News
It may look like pretty ordinary stuff — that long, tickly grass that lurks under the water when you go swimming.
But seagrass plays a crucial role in marine ecosystems, and it’s on the decline, thanks in large part to human activity.
Until recently, there wasn’t a way to measure those human activities, like run-off from farming, shellfish aquaculture and coastal development.
Researchers in Nova Scotia at Dalhousie University and the Bedford Institute of Oceanography have changed that. They analyzed data for a number of factors, including nutrient pollution, population density, coastal land protection, land use, invasive species, commercial fishing and aquaculture, and figured out how to quantify those activities.