Fowl Stake Roosts / Seagrass Regrowth Areas

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December 16, 2024 · 11:40 am

I’ve all the time questioned what these white plastic poles have been protruding of the water all through the keys… now I do know… and you’ll too!

Whereas on a catamaran on our technique to Lignumvitae Key we previous a number of areas the place birds have been roosting on stakes pitched within the ocean as I started to query their objective. In talking with a park ranger I discovered that these are seagrass regrowth areas led to by boating accidents, propeller scars, and working aground. If caught, as this gentleman was, the park ranger mentioned he was fined $27,000 and pressured by the courts to pay it for destroying the seagrass mattress by working aground!

There’s a typical three-step course of in recovering these important marine habitats, they’re: Sediment fill for deep scars, transplanting of close by seagrass, and chook stake roosts.

We’ll concentrate on the latter, chook stake roosts. Fowl stakes are used when the harm happens in lower than 5 ft of water. Like all crops, seagrass want vitamins to develop. It’s potential to encourage sooner regrowth of seagrass in an injured space by fertilizing it with the wanted vitamins. Nevertheless, chemical fertilizer is pricey and must be changed each few months. Another is to make use of a free, pure supply of fertilizer—chook feces. As soon as an harm has been returned to grade with sediment fill, scientists set up chook roosting stakes all through the harm. These chook stakes lengthen about 10 inches above the excessive water stage mark. After a hearty meal, birds come to relaxation on the stakes—and do what birds do after consuming. The feces deposited by the roosting birds attain the underside in concentrated doses, naturally fertilizing the realm to encourage seagrass regrowth. Fowl stake roosts are eliminated after roughly 18 months of the restoration course of.

    

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