Epiphyte Biomass on Artificial Seagrass in Culebra, Puerto Rico, 2023-2024

Estimates of epiphyte biomass accumulation on artificial seagrass leaves at 13 monitoring stations in Culebra, Puerto Rico. The data was collected by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to test epiphyte load as a biological indicator for nutrient impacts. Experiments were run twice, with installations deployed for 60–90 days between August 2023 and February 2024.

Use Cases

• Modeling spatial patterns of nutrient impact based on epiphyte biomass accumulation across 13 stations.
• Correlating epiphyte load with nearshore water quality conditions mentioned in the description.
• Assessing the effectiveness of upland watershed restoration interventions by comparing treated and untreated locations.
• Analyzing biomass accumulation rates (mg/cm2/day) over two experimental deployment periods.

Strengths

• Data collected at 13 fixed monitoring stations, providing spatial coverage.
• Two experimental runs with deployments lasting 60–90 days in 2023-2024.
• Methodology follows a cited protocol (Virnstein & Curran, 1986) with documented modifications.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data is provided in PDF format, which may require extraction for computational analysis.

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce

Collection Method

Artificial seagrass installations were deployed, recovered, and epiphyte biomass was scraped, dried, and weighed. Mean accumulation was computed in mg/cm2/day.

Time Range

August 2023 to February 2024

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 22:18:28.330741; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Ensenada Honda and Puerto Manglar, Culebra, Puerto Rico, Caribbean Sea