When Hurricane Irma plowed into Florida ’s southwest coast as a powerful Category 4 violent storm last calendar month , it tore up seagrass bed , stripped Rhizophora mangle woodland of their parting , and overall , left whatlooked like a lead of ecological apocalypsein its wake . But it ’s now been a few calendar week since the storm , and as scientists go out and assess the wrong to the South Florida ’s ecosystems , they ’re set forth to notice some bright spots .
Afterdoing an aerial flyover of Florida Bay after the stormand pick out enormous stand of dead seagrass , Everglades Foundation wetland ecologist Steve Davis was distressed . The tantrum reminded him of a seagrass dieoff that pass off in the summertime of 2015 , when the true laurel — a shallow estuary bounded by the Everglades wetlands to the Union and Keys to the south — became too salty , owe to high-pitched temperatures and a dearth of rain . Thedieoff precipitated enormous alga blooms , actuate fish kills anddealing a major blowto Florida ’s commercial and recreational fishing economies .
But when Davis went out on the bay laurel with some sportfishing templet and a fistful of reporters last week , what he take in was quite different . “ We did see some large floating matts of locoweed , like we see a few week prior in overflight , ” he articulate . But , rather than creating a huge dead - zone , all that detritus appears to have triggered a feasting frenzy .
“ You ’re seeing loads of things like peewee and crabs associated with those [ all in seagrass ] matts , ” Davis said . “ The Pisces , ” particularly tarpon , “ were just in heaven eating the shrimp . ”
“ So this is one of the positive benefit — a Brobdingnagian slug of constitutional matter is providing a food generator for recreationally - important mintage , ” he added .
While it ’s still early days for assessing Florida Bay ’s recovery , Davis ’ observations paint a unlike picture from the 2015 seagrass dieoff , when vast meadows of turtleneck Gunter Grass that take shape the fundament of the ecosystem were completely scoured . What Hurricane Irma did , he thinks , was more blood-related to someone weeding a garden than bulldozing it .
“ After hurricanes , we [ typically ] see huge amounts of seagrass mob up on beaches , but when we go await for the source , we do n’t see declamatory areas denuded , ” Jim Fourqurean , a seagrass ecologist and prof at Florida International University , told Earther . Instead , ecologist see cutting of the seagrass bed , which is far less destructive . Fourqurean added that scientific surveys of the bay are just starting up this workweek . “ In a calendar month , we ’ll be capable to give a good appraisal of cutting , ” he said .
While there are probable to be localized regions of spartan equipment casualty , Fourqurean says that overall , Florida Bay might emerge strong as a result of the storm , owing to Irma ’s effects on water system quality . The bay laurel exchanges very little water system with the beleaguer sea , and it also does n’t get nearly as much freshwater from the Everglades ’ wetlands as it did in the twenty-four hour period before human small town . But during the lead story - up to Irma , a vast amount of water was suck up out of the bay , only to be replenished with refreshful brine when the storm plow back in .
It ’s a bit like someone just refreshed a 850 - square - mile fish tank tank .
“ My major professor always said what Florida Bay really take to be healthy was a practiced hurricane once in a while to blow all the accumulated organic matter out of the bay , ” Fourqurean said . “ If that hypothesis were true , the alcove should be better off next year , ” except for any areas where the seagrass was entirely scoured .
Davis added that the storm ’s rainfall led to significant freshwater recharge in the Everglades wetland and further north , all the way up to Lake Okeechobee and the Kissimmee Valley . “ It brought us a lot of pee and that overflow is still play out today , ” he said . This could be a boon not only for the true laurel , but for the fresh water - starved wetlands northerly of it .
Of naturally , ecologists are still worried about some of the other impingement Irma might have had on Everglades ecosystems , include the severely - defoliate mangrove forests on Florida ’s southwest coast , and the fresh water - adapted marshes that examine a pregnant pulse of saltwater from the storm ’s surge . accord to Evelyn Gaiser , principal tec for the Florida Coastal Everglades Long Term Ecological Research Program , while Hurricane Wilma ( 2005 ) brought in sediment that helped build up the mangrove forests ’s soil , Irma might have done the opposite .
“ We ’re inquire whether or not that immense drawing out of water keep abreast by a big billow [ during Irma ] might have redistributed that cloth that had been so helpful [ to the Rhizophora mangle woods ] from Wilma , ” Gaiser told Earther . As for the sawgrass marshes further inland , she ’s implicated that Irma “ may have brought a lot of salty water into office that are crossing tipping point toward prostration , ” due to freshwater starving .
Gaiser and her colleagues are write a proposal to the National Science Foundation for funds that would permit them to better meditate Irma ’s impacts , and they ’re conducting additional survey work this week .
Irma was clearly a cataclysm for South Florida . It cut down out power for jillion , wrecked homes , trigged a horrific sewerage crisis , and caused an estimated$19.4 billion in wind damage alone . Many communities will be dealing with the tempest ’s impacts for a tenacious meter . Parts of the Everglades could also take twelvemonth to recover .
Still , it ’s significant to retrieve that resiliency does survive , bothin the peopleaffected by this devastating hurricane time of year and , as Davis and others are now seeing , the ecosystems .
“ There ’ve been hurricanes as long as Florida ’s been here , ” Fourqurean say . “At least with the historical strength and cyclicity of hurricanes , [ these ecosystem ] have done mulct . ”
The question is how the Everglades will come in a time to come where human induce climate change makes everything harder . The answerwill bet on how well we take maintenance of it .
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