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Mangroves

The Ocean Portal Team

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A thick stand of mangroves with tangled roots lines an island creek in Panama.

Credit:

Ilka C. Feller/Smithsonian Institution

Mangroves are survivors. With their roots submerged in water, mangrove trees thrive in hot, muddy, salty conditions that would quickly kill most plants. How do they do it? Through a series of impressive adaptations—including a filtration system that keeps out much of the salt and a complex root system that holds the mangrove upright in the shifting sediments where land and water meet. Not only do mangroves manage to survive in challenging conditions, the mangrove ecosystem also supports an incredible diversity of creatures—including some species unique to mangrove forests. And, as scientists are discovering, mangrove swamps are extremely important to our own well-being and to the health of the planet. The question is: Will mangroves be able to survive the impact of human activities?

Ecosystem Basics

At Home in the Mangrove Forest

Brown pelicans (Pelecanus occidentalis) nest in a mangrove in Ecuador’s Galapagos Islands.

Credit:

Mark Jones

At Home in the Mangrove Forest

A pair of brown pelicans and their chick have taken up residence in this mangrove tree. Many other kinds of birds also nest, roost, and feed in mangroves. And they’re not alone. Mangroves buzz with insects. Ants, spiders, moths, termites, and scorpions feed and nest in hollowed twigs. Snakes and lizards crawl along tree limbs. Frogs cling to bark and leaves. Crocodiles laze in the salt water. There are about 70 species of mangroves, ranging from sprawling shrubs to trees that stand 60 meters (200 feet) high and provide habitats for organisms large and small. All are adapted to living in shallow seawater. Some can live in places nearly three times saltier than the sea. As a whole, mangroves are among the most productive and biologically complex ecosystems on Earth.

Featured Creatures

Science

Mangrove Research at the Smithsonian

Marc Frischer from the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography studies bacteria at a Smithsonian field station.

Credit:

Smithsonian Institution

Mangrove Research at the Smithsonian

How diverse are mangroves? How do their components work? What threats do they face—and how can we conserve them? Smithsonian scientists and colleagues from around the world are searching for answers to these and other urgent questions. The scientists make use of the extensive collections at the National Museum of Natural History as well as the facilities at several Smithsonian research stations outside of Washington, D.C.—including an environmental research center in Maryland, a tropical research institute in Panama, and field stations along the Atlantic and Caribbean coasts from Florida to Panama. These natural laboratories enable the scientists to conduct long-term studies on mangrove ecosystems from a range of latitudes.

Scientists

Dr. Ilka C. "Candy" Feller calls mangroves the 'nursery of the sea.' These important coastal habitats face many threats, including nutrient pollution from fertilizer runoff. That's the focus of much of Feller's work; she's a scientist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. In this short video, Feller takes viewers on a tour of one of her field experiments in Belize.

Credit:

Anne Chamberlain/Smithsonian Institution

Dr. Ilka C. “Candy” Feller: Swamp Explorer

“As a child, I played in a swamp near my grandmother’s house,” says Dr. Candy Feller. “I still do the same thing today.” Dr. Feller spends much of her time perched in mangrove trees or sitting among their gnarled thickets—counting, measuring, weighing, photographing and comparing the leaves and insects she finds. An insect and plant ecologist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, she has collected dozens of insects once unknown to science. For more than 15 years, she has been carefully fertilizing mangroves to understand how excess nutrients—like those from industrial, residential, and agricultural sources—affect mangrove ecosystems.

Dr. Karen L. McKee collects a peat core in a mangrove forest in Belize.

Credit:

Courtesy of Karen McGee/The Wetland Foundation

Dr. Karen L McKee: Mangrove Defender

What happens on tropical islands when mangroves are removed and human development moves in? That’s one question Dr. Karen L. McKee set out to answer on the Pelican Cays and Twin Cays ranges in Belize. Developers there want to clear-cut mangroves and dredge fill to raise the elevation of the land and create sand islands. Dr. McKee found out that when mangroves are removed, the islands begin to sink and erode. Nearby reef flats and seagrass beds are also destroyed because dredge material is taken from those habitats. Dr. McKee is a research ecologist at the National Wetlands Research Center of the U.S. Geological Survey.

Threats & Solutions

Human Connections

Protective Fringe

Red mangroves form an impenetrable, protective barrier against storms and tsunamis.

Credit:

Smithsonian Institution

Protective Fringe

Mangroves form dense barriers against storms and tsunamis, saving lives and protecting property. They also provide us with many other important benefits—more than many people may realize. For example, mangroves produce seafood, fruits, medicines, fiber, and wood. They stabilize shores by trapping sediments and building land. They improve water quality by filtering runoff and polluted waters. They protect the climate by absorbing carbon dioxide and reducing the amount of greenhouse gas. All in all, researchers estimate, the world's mangrove forests provide human communities with many billions of dollars worth of free services.

Comments

I´m not an expert on web

I´m not an expert on web pages, but for me the general concept is great. Regarding mangroves, a subjet I know some, I have some comments and suggestions.

In the first line, of the first paragraph, you use the word "survivor" and if you check the meaning of this word, it refers to somebody or something who overpass and event in which others have died. This is not the case of mangroves. Their ancestors where fresh water specieas that have evolve phisological, morphological, mechanical and reproductive adatations for millios of year

Regarding salinity tolerenace yo enphasize filtration or ultafiltration and this is not very clear (please correct me!!!). I suggest to include excretion, so evident and easy to show in species of Avicenia and Rhizophora. At the same time it will be very interestig to explain the unique process of excretion in mangroves.

I will add two or three lines on how mangroves trap sediements, facilitating land acreation.

One last thing, I did not find anything about the impact of climate change and sea level rise on mangroves.

Excuse my simple English!!!

Excelent view and

Excelent view and conservation of all our earth is the balance of life and this site help to understand the nature of our future. Thank you

The Toolkit banner and the

The Toolkit banner and the related links seem to interrupt the flow of learning about Mangroves. Consider relocating those tangential items to the bottom of the page, below the closely related resources you've prepared.

Point well taken. I agree! I

Point well taken. I agree! I can't even read all of the above comment because the toolbar banner is blocking part of the text.

Bob Gillespie

I think that you should

I think that you should include information about the different types of mangroves as well.

OMG THANK YOU SO MUCH, I WAS

OMG THANK YOU SO MUCH, I WAS ABLE TO COMPLETE MY PROJECT.

this picture is awesome!

it was very informative!!!!

I am doing a project on creek

I am doing a project on creek restoration and mangroves are the first topic for me to take into the schools here on Andros Island in The Bahamas and i have found most of this information to be very informative especially the information on human connection, so i thank you very much for such valuable information in all...

FOR EDUCATORS

Mangroves

Ecosystem Basics

Featured Creatures

Science

Threats & Solutions

Human Connections

More like this

Comments

I´m not an expert on web

Excelent view and

The Toolkit banner and the

Point well taken. I agree! I

I think that you should

OMG THANK YOU SO MUCH, I WAS

this picture is awesome!

it was very informative!!!!

I am doing a project on creek

How many mangrove forests are

i hope the mangroves will

It was nice to read the brief

It was great to know about

Better information ever made

very nice

Consider relocating those

cool mangroves really good,

interesting

mangroves are very very

what is the treat to the

more ideas to come ..i love

u dont have eough information

What kind of extra

it is very helpful

Mangroves

ummmm... where are the

aaaf

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FOR EDUCATORS

Mangroves

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