The effect of substrate media on the survival and growth of the eelgrass Zostera marina

ABSTRACT

We subjected transplants of eelgrass (Zostera marina) to different substrate media (high-silted soil, akadama soil, peat soil, humus soil, pond soil and natural sediment) for over 25 days under controlled laboratory conditions. Subsequently, an 80-day field transplantation experiment was conducted to assess the establishment success of transplants planted in high-silted soil, akadama soil and natural sediment. We measured plant response in terms of survivorship, morphology and productivity. Survival analysis combined with morphological and productivity assessment suggested that the optimum growing medium for the establishment of Z. marina transplants is high-silted soil. A redundancy analysis (RDA) revealed that the survival and growth of Z. marina transplants were positively related to the air-filled porosity of the substrate media and were negatively related to the organic matter content. This study will provide data that could prove helpful in successful eelgrass restoration and conservation.

SUBJECT EDITOR:

• Margot Hessing-Lewis

KEYWORDS:

• Growing media
• morphology
• productivity
• transplantation
• Zostera marina

Acknowledgements

We thank Qian Zhang, Jian-Sheng Zhao and Le-Zheng Qin for their assistance during sample collection and calculations.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Pei-Dong Zhang http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1564-1807

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 41576112]; National Marine Public Welfare Research Project [grant number 201405010]; Key Research and Development Plan of Shandong Province [grant number 2017GSF217002] and National Basic Research Priorities Program of China [grant number 2015FY110600].