Ohio Sea Grant Research eNewsletter April 2024

Webinar: November 21, 2024

Smallmouth bass are one of the top fish in Lake Erie’s fishery, contributing to the lake’s $1 billion fishing industry. Yet until recently, scientists were unaware of how much the fish move around in the lake — insights that could help ensure the fishery is sustainable. The fish species were once concerned to be a low-movement species, but a portion of the population is likely making long-distance movements based on a pilot study. Bass vulnerable to fishing are known to have higher aggression and metabolism, and if these fish are also traversing long distances, angling may be impacting the connectivity of bass populations.

Zak Slagle of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources Division of Wildlife is using acoustic telemetry to study how much smallmouth bass move, when they move, what habitats they prefer, and if angler-caught fish have higher movement rates than “unselected” fish. The team tagged 210 bass across Lake Erie in 2023 and 2024 using both electrofishing and angling during spawning season and will track these fish through 2027.

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Webinar: August 20, 2024

Harmful algal blooms and hypoxic zones, or areas with low oxygen, are leading environmental problems in Lake Erie, adversely affecting water quality and fish habitat. Despite their importance, the characteristics and long-term variability of the hypoxic zones in the lake remain poorly understood.

Dr. Fasong Yuan of Cleveland State University is leading multifaceted research to shed light on the dynamics and long-term changes in the lake’s hypoxic zones to help inform policy makers, stakeholders, and resource managers. Researchers are gathering in-situ sensor timeseries data to characterize both nearshore and offshore hypoxic systems, employing stable isotopes of dissolved inorganic carbon to offer a quantitative understanding of oxygen-consuming organic matter in hypoxic waters, and analyzing surface sediments and sediment cores to yield insights into long-term evolution of hypoxia dynamics across the transition zone between hypoxia and normoxia, or areas with normal oxygen level, in central Lake Erie off the coast of Cleveland.

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Scientists are unsure how increasing precipitation associated with climate change will impact storm sewer infrastructure along Lake Erie’s coast. Studies are needed to explore how solutions like green infrastructure and low impact development can reduce stormwater runoff compared to traditional, “gray” infrastructure.

Dr. Suresh Sharma of Youngstown State University is studying how green infrastructure can mitigate climate change’s impact on stormwater runoff with an emphasis on community engagement. Methods include downscaling and bias correcting climate data from different climate models, as well as experimenting with various community-preferred green infrastructures for their efficacy in stormwater runoff reduction.

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Webinar: June 18, 2024

Ahead of NOAA’s annual Lake Erie HABs Forecast on June 27, catch up on the background and future of Lake Erie’s HABs with Ohio Sea Grant’s Dr. Chris Winslow. This primer will include up-to-date information on topics such as nutrient sources in the Maumee River watershed that drive blooms, the progress toward meeting nutrient load reduction goals, and best practices for farmers. Dr. Winslow will also provide updates on the state’s Harmful Algal Bloom Research Initiative research efforts, as well as the Lake Erie and Aquatic Research Network’s wetland research projects for the H2Ohio initiative.

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Webinar: May 16, 2024

Microcystins are some of the most abundant and potent harmful algal bloom toxins and have emerged as a public health concern due to the potential to cause severe organ injury including liver damage. While currently there are no targeted therapies to protect against microcystin exposure, previous research found that naturally occurring bacteria from Lake Erie had the ability to degrade algal toxins such as microcystin.

Drs. Steven Haller and David Kennedy of The University of Toledo have made significant progress in discovering a potential treatment for microcystin exposure through probiotics. Researchers ran in vitro experiments on human liver cells as well as model experiments on mice to find out if microcystin-degrading bacteria can function as probiotics to protect against organ damage from toxin exposure. notextile.

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Webinar: July 16, 2024

Stormwater runoff carries pollution from land into nearby bodies of water, a phenomenon made worse by more frequent and severe storms due to climate change. Meanwhile, marinas on the Great Lakes can release pollutants — oil, grease, antifreeze, and boat paint — and exacerbate runoff with impervious parking lots and rooftops. This puts marinas in a unique position to become a part of the solution.

Dr. Scott Hardy, Ohio Sea Grant extension educator, and Sarah Orlando, Clean Marinas program manager, worked as part of a collaboration between the Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin Sea Grant programs to improve stormwater management at Great Lakes marinas by implementing green infrastructure. The project has produced tangible results: demonstration sites with best management practices, an online toolkit website, and water quality monitoring research led by Dr. Ryan Winston of The Ohio State University’s Stormwater Management Program.

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Webinar: April 24, 2024

The Great Lakes provide a host of ecosystem services to many millions of people but are under threat from multiple stressors, including cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms (CHABs). To date CHABs in the Great Lakes have been investigated lake-by-lake or even river-by-river, with studies in each location tuned to local perspectives and framed with different research questions, making it difficult to generalize findings and determine how results from one location can be applied elsewhere.

Drs. George Bullerjahn, Bowling Green State University; Bob Sterner, University of Minnesota-Duluth; and Todd Miller, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, have standardized an experimental approach to compare how patterns of nitrogen and phosphorus affect algal blooms and vary across Lakes Superior, Michigan, and Erie and how those are influenced by temperature and climate change. The results are illuminating the similarities and differences in how blooms start, persist and produce toxins in these diverse environments and will inform more specific bloom management strategies.

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Most agricultural land in the western basin of Lake Erie relies on drainage practices such as tile drainage and channelization to successfully grow crops on fertile yet poorly drained soils. However, water discharge from drainage can hinder surface water quality far beyond farm fields, with nutrient runoff fueling harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie. Recent research has demonstrated that agricultural drainage ditches can play an important and necessary role in mitigating downstream water quality impacts from agricultural land use.

Dr. Jonathan Witter and other researchers at The Ohio State University are studying how different channel designs affect nutrient and sediment retention dynamics along experimental reaches of drainage channels in central and northwest Ohio.

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