Rachel Aileen Brewton

Florida Atlantic University | FAU · Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute

The oceanographic ecology of pelagic Sargassum, and the means by which these floating macroalgae thrive in the nutrient-poor waters of the open ocean, have been studied for decades. Beginning in 2011, the Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt (GASB) emerged, with Sargassum proliferating in the tropical Atlantic and Caribbean where it had not previously bee...

Nitrogen (N) loading can affect estuarine food webs through alteration of primary producers. In the Indian River Lagoon (IRL), Florida there has been long-term N enrichment, worsening phytoplankton blooms, large-scale macroalgal blooms, and catastrophic seagrass losses. To investigate how N enrichment affects higher trophic levels and food webs in...

In Florida's Indian River Lagoon (IRL), anthropogenic eutrophication has resulted in harmful algal blooms and catastrophic seagrass losses. Hoping to improve water quality, policy makers enacted fertilizer bans, assuming that this would reduce the nitrogen (N) load. To assess the effectiveness of these bans, seawater and macroalgal samples were col...

The coastal communities of Lee County, Florida, USA have grown rapidly since the 1970s. In this county, drainage ditches, canals, creeks, and the Caloosahatchee River Estuary often have high concentrations of nutrients and bacteria limiting their designated uses. Septic systems have previously been identified as a major pollution source in some are...

Wastewater management is a critical issue globally. In Florida, the importance of this issue is heightened by the proximity to sensitive ecosystems. Distributed wastewater treatment units (DWTU) are a recent, state-approved alternative to septic system conversions to centralized sewer infrastructure. In this study, the performance of a DWTU was tes...

As human population growth has expanded in Southwest Florida, water quality has become degraded with an increased occurrence of harmful algal blooms (HABs). Red tide (Karenia brevis) originating offshore, intensifies in nearshore waters along Florida's Gulf Coast, and blue-green algae (Microcystis spp.) originating in Lake Okeechobee is discharged...

Effluent from septic systems can pollute groundwater and surface waters in coastal watersheds. These effects are unknown for the highly urbanized central Indian River Lagoon (CIRL), Florida, where septic systems represent > 50% of wastewater disposal. To better understand these impacts, water quality was assessed along both canals and a tributary t...

The pelagic brown macroalgae Sargassum spp. have grown for centuries in oligotrophic waters of the North Atlantic Ocean supported by natural nutrient sources, such as excretions from associated fishes and invertebrates, upwelling, and N2 fixation. Using a unique historical baseline, we show that since the 1980s the tissue %N of Sargassum spp. has i...

Harmful algal blooms that can produce toxins are common in the Indian River Lagoon (IRL), which covers ~250 km of Florida's east coast. The current study assessed the dynamics of microcystins and saxitoxin in six segments of the IRL: Banana River Lagoon (BRL), Mosquito Lagoon (ML), Northern IRL (NIRL), Central IRL (CIRL), Southern IRL (SIRL), and t...

The extensive blooms of the pelagic Sargassum in the Atlantic raised the question of whether this brown seaweed may play an important role in climate change mitigation through carbon fixation and carbon sequestration, as argued in several recent papers. Using simple calculations and published values on Sargassum coverage, biomass density, carbon/bi...

The comment by Julian (2020) criticizes aspects of our paper, “Nitrogen enrichment, altered stoichiometry, and coral reef decline at Looe Key, Florida Keys, USA.” The comment begins by misrepresenting our extensive literature review, while providing no justification for the claim of a “skewed reading.” Julian’s critique focused on methods of data h...

Historically, extensive seagrass meadows were common throughout the Indian River Lagoon (IRL) in east-central Florida, USA. Between 2011 and 2017, widespread catastrophic seagrass losses (~95%) occurred in the IRL following unprecedented harmful algal blooms (HABs), including persistent brown tides (Aureoumbra lagunensis). Little is known about how...

Increased loadings of nitrogen (N) from fertilizers, top soil, sewage, and atmospheric deposition are important drivers of eutrophication in coastal waters globally. Monitoring seawater and macroalgae can reveal long-term changes in N and phosphorus (P) availability and N:P stoichiometry that are critical to understanding the global crisis of coral...

In the Gulf of Mexico (GOM), oil and gas platforms have created an expansive network of artificial reefs. Generally, policies mandate removal of these structures post-production; however, many enter ‘Rigs-to-Reefs’ (RTR) programs that convert the rig materials into artificial reefs (‘reefing’). Despite the growth of RTR programs worldwide, the func...

Field and laboratory experiments are designed to measure Sargassum biomass per area (density), surface reflectance, nutrient contents, and pigment concentrations. An alternative floating algae index-biomass density model is established to link the spectral reflectance to Sargassum biomass density, with a relative uncertainty of ~12%. Monthly mean i...

Oyster reefs are important components of marine ecosystems and function as essential habitat for estuarine species; however, few studies have simultaneously compared natural intertidal reefs to more well-studied seagrass meadows and marsh habitats. We investigated habitat use within an estuarine mosaic consisting of intertidal oyster reef (Crassost...

Dolphinfish Coryphaena hippurus support important commercial and recreational fisheries in the Gulf of Mexico. Understanding the feeding ecology of this economically important pelagic fish is key to its sustainable management; however, dietary data from this region are sparse. We conducted a comprehensive diet study to develop new trophic baselines...

The BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill has great potential to negatively affect estuarine fish populations. In order to assess possible impacts of this event, a series of sublethal lab experiments were performed, using the economically and ecologically important species spotted seatrout (Cynoscion nebulosus). Larval and juvenile spotted seatrout were e...

The April 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill impacted shoreline marshes and estuaries in the northern Gulf of Mexico (GOM). Spotted seatrout (Cynoscion nebulosus) are an estuarine resident, spring-summer spawning species in the GOM; thus, both adult and young-of-the-year fish were potentially exposed to oiled waters during 2010. We compared historica...

It is important to understand energy flow in marine food webs, and one way to do this is through the diet analyses. For most fish diet analyses are difficult, because a large portion (many times > 50%) of stomach contents are unidentified due to advanced states of digestion. Identifying these prey to genus or species could help answer long-standing...

Background/Question/Methods Oyster reefs (Crassostrea virginica) are an important component of marine ecosystems and a highly valued fishery resource that may be essential habitat for many estuarine species. The Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Conservation and Management Act (recently reauthorized in 2007) mandates that necessary measures must be taken...