Seagrass
Marine flowering plants forming productive underwater meadows.
Last updated
Seagrasses are flowering plants fully adapted to submerged aquatic life in marine and estuarine environments.[1] They evolved from land plants about 100 million years ago and retain leaves, roots, flowers, seeds, and conducting tissues.[1] Seagrasses are important ecosystem engineers that provide critical habitat for many vertebrate and invertebrate species.[1]
Scientific classification
- CladeTracheophytes
- CladeAngiosperms
- CladeMonocots
- OrderAlismatales
Sources: Wikipedia taxobox: Seagrass (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Quick Facts
- Species count
- about 60
- Order
- Alismatales
- Clade
- monocotyledons
- Key ecosystem role
- carbon sinks
- habitats
- and food for marine life
Facts from the source article.
Biology and range
Crustaceans and syllid polychaete worm larvae have been found with pollen grains, and the plant produces nutritious mucigenous clumps of pollen to attract them.[2] There are about 60 species of fully marine seagrasses belonging to four families in the order Alismatales.[3] In the submerged photic zone, seagrasses carry out photosynthesis, and they are typically found anchored in sandy or muddy bottoms within shallow, protected coastal waters.[2] Underwater pollination is the norm for most seagrass species, and their entire life cycle is completed beneath the surface.[2]
These meadows serve as significant carbon sinks and offer habitat and nourishment for a wide array of marine organisms, with a diversity level that rivals that of coral reefs.[4] Coastal waters' physical, chemical, and biological conditions are substantially altered by the presence of seagrasses.[5] Posidonia oceanica is recognized as one of the planet's most ancient and massive species; a single individual can create meadows that span almost 15 kilometers in width.[6]
What the specialist sources record
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission notes that seagrasses are typically considered a nursery habitat for commercially important fish, crustaceans, and shellfish.[1] The same source states that seagrass roots and rhizomes stabilize sediment around coastal areas, much like land grasses reduce soil erosion.[1] According to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, seagrasses need clear water to receive enough light to photosynthesize.[1] The BBC Radio 4 program "39 Ways to Save the Planet" describes seagrass meadows as working naturally to absorb carbon.[7]
A CNN report from 2024 explains that camera-equipped tiger sharks revealed the world's largest known seagrass ecosystem, covering up to 92,000 square kilometers in the Bahamas.[8] The United Nations Environment Programme report outlines that seagrasses provide ecosystem services including fisheries support, water purification, coastal protection, and carbon sequestration.[9] The "Seagrasses" educational resource states that seagrasses are a very important food source and habitat for wildlife, supporting fish, octopuses, sea turtles, shrimp, and many other organisms.[10]
References
- "Seagrass FAQ", Florida Fish And Wildlife Conservation Commission. facts only, no text reused. myfwc.com
- Wikipedia, "Seagrass" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: van Tussenbroek, "Experimental evidence of pollination in marine flowers by invertebrate fauna", Nature Communications, 29 September 2016 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Seagrass" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Tomlinson and Vargo, "On the morphology and anatomy of turtle grass, Thalassia testudinum (Hydrocharitaceae). I. Vegetative Morphology.", Bulletin of Marine Science, 1966, p. 748–761 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Seagrass" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "39 Ways to Save the Planet - Sublime Seagrass", BBC Radio 4 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Seagrass" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Papenbrock, "Highlights in Seagrasses' Phylogeny, Physiology, and Metabolism: What Makes Them Special?", ISRN Botany, 2012, p. 1–15 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Seagrass" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Arnaud-Haond, "Implications of Extreme Life Span in Clonal Organisms: Millenary Clones in Meadows of the Threatened Seagrass Posidonia oceanica", PLOS ONE, 2012; Vacchi, "Biogeomorphology of the Mediterranean Posidonia oceanicaseagrass meadows", Earth Surface Processes and Landforms, 2017, p. 42–54; Tripathi, "Nitric Oxide Ameliorates Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles Phytotoxicity in Wheat Seedlings: Implication of the Ascorbate–Glutathione Cycle", Frontiers in Plant Science, 2017, p. 1; Montefalcone, "Flowering of the seagrass Posidonia oceanica in N en.wikipedia.org
- "39 Ways to Save the Planet - Sublime Seagrass", BBC Radio 4. facts only, no text reused. bbc.co.uk
- Lewis, "How tiger sharks wearing cameras revealed the world's largest seagrass ecosystem", CNN, 2024-03-28. facts only, no text reused. cnn.com
- United Nations Environment Programme (2020). Out of the blue: The value of seagrasses to the environment and to people. UNEP, Nairobi. https://www.unenvironment. facts only, no text reused. unenvironment.org
- "Seagrasses". facts only, no text reused. nwf.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Seagrass (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
More in Aquatic & Wetland Plants
Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Seagrass (CC BY-SA 4.0).
- Word definitions: the , each quoted from its Wikipedia article.
Spotted an error? Know more?
Reader corrections go straight into our review queue. Suggest an edit · How this site is sourced