Biscayne National Park–While many of us have been gawking at the crabs, anoles, and sea birds–and others have been paddling their way over coral reefs admiring the fish–some scientists at the bioblitz are quite animated by the algae.
At last count, about 20 species of algae may have been been identified, many of them new to the park’s list of species.
Mark Ladd is a masters student in the Environmental Studies program working under Dr. Ligia Collado-Vides. at Florida International University. I met him and Glauco A Puig-Santana, an undergraduate student at Florida International University in the premed field. In this video they talk about algae they observed and collected on Elliott Key.
Back at the science tent at the bioblitz base camp, where we bloggers also have work stations, I met Elizabeth Lacey, an ecologist also working in Florida International University’s Marine Macroalgae Research Laboratory. Elizabeth demonstrated how she and her assistants were cataloguing and preparing the specimens of algae for a herbarium.
Posted by David Braun