Conference

26 & 27 October 2021

Coastal Wetlands Twitter Conference

OVERVIEW

The Global Wetlands Project hosted the inaugural Coastal Wetlands Twitter Conference on Tuesday 26 and Wednesday 27 October 2021. The #CWTC21 conference was held completely on Twitter – with internet access you could participate in the conference. Presenters, following a conference schedule, delivered their presentation via Tweets.

The conference program and links to the Twitter presentations can be found below. You can also view the Twitter presentations by searching ‘#CWTC21’ in Twitter. The four keynote talks (10 minutes each) are available on The Global Wetlands Project YouTube Channel.

The Twitter conference provided the opportunity for students, scientists, coastal wetland managers and policy-makers to come together and share their research and experiences of coastal wetlands on an international stage. A review of the engagement on Twitter with the presentations can be found on The Global Wetlands Project blog.

The #CWTC21 conference was based around three themes:

The Blue economy

The Blue economy

Coastal wetlands are important, high-value ecosystems that provide many benefits to humanity. They contribute to the blue economy: support rich biodiversity, underpin human livelihoods and recreation, store carbon and protect coastal communities from extreme weather events.

Future of coastal wetlands

Future of coastal wetlands

Unfortunately, we are losing our seagrass meadows, mangrove forests and saltmarshes. Over 50% of coastal wetlands are already gone and the rest are at risk from a range of serious threats. What does the future hold for coastal wetlands?

New technologies

New technologies

New technology can play a vital role in supporting us in limiting and reversing the loss of coastal wetlands. Delivering technology solutions to be as effective and efficient with the resources we have for coastal wetland conservation is critical to our success.

CONFERENCE PROGRAM

First session was held 9.00am – 11.10am BST, Tuesday 26 October
To view the Twitter presentations, click on the title below.

TIME PRESENTER TWITTER HANDLE TITLE
9.00am BST Kerrylee Rogers @KerryleeRogers_ Coastal ecosystems are highly dynamic and global change models need your local-scale data
9.10am BST Cameron Webb @mozziebites Managing mosquitoes associated with coastal wetlands in urban environments
9.20am BST James Robinson @jamesthetyke Managed realignment in the UK: progress and barriers
9.30am BST Thomas Worthington @mangroves The Mangrove Restoration Tracker Tool: a global restoration reporting framework to meet local practitioner needs
9.40am BST Ariana Magini @ArianaMags Intertidal Integration: Can climate policy integration facilitate Nature-Based Solutions implementation such as mangrove and coastal wetlands restoration in Australia?
9.50am BST Alyssa Giffin @AlyssaGiffin Marine and coastal ecosystem-based climate adaptation strategies
10.00am BST Maria Mas @Bats_Mas Winter bat activity: the role of wetlands as food and drinking reservoirs in a Climate Change scenario
10.10am BST Riccardo Losciale @RLosciale A Climate Vulnerability Index for “World Heritage seagrass habitats”
10.20am BST Jackson Stockbridge @jackson_stock A cautionary tale about spatial cumulative impact assessments of seagrasses
10.30am BST Mischa Turschwell @turschwell Context matters for mangrove conservation
10.40am BST Andria Ostrowski @AndriaOstrowski Stressors in the real world: Evaluating multiple stressor research in coastal wetlands
10.50am BST

 

11.00am BST

Ana Sousa

 

Carmen Santos

@anaifsousa

 

@cbdelosantos

Nature-based Solutions foster intertidal seagrass resilience and restoration success: guidelines and upscaling program


Recent trend reversal for declining European seagrass meadows

Second session was held 13.00pm – 15.00pm PDT, Tuesday 26 October
To view the Twitter presentations, click on the title below.

TIME PRESENTER TWITTER HANDLE TITLE
13.00pm PDT Michael Sievers @SieversSci Global typologies of coastal wetland status
13.10pm PDT Charles Cadier @charles_cadier Indicators of coastal wetlands restoration success: a systematic review
13.20pm PDT Michael Bradley @japhybradley Fish habitat futures: context-dependence in ecosystem services
13.30pm PDT Rod Connolly @ConnollyLab One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish: supercharging citizen science through automated wetland monitoring
13.40pm PDT Abigail Barenblitt @abarenblitt Invasion in the Niger Delta: Using Google Earth Engine to remotely sense mangrove conversion to Nypa fruticans from 2015-2020
13.50pm PDT Hannah Morrissette @hkmorrissette Belize Blue Carbon – Creating a Baseline
14.00pm PDT Zoë Shribman @zshribz Mangrove necromass: exploring the blue carbon potential of dead roots
14.10pm PDT Anna Armitage @MarshDispatch The ebb and flow of mangrove encroachment in the Gulf of Mexico: recovery dynamics following a major cold damage event
14.20pm PDT Clayton Hale @ClaytonHale3 Regeneration of an Imperilled Tree Species Post Cyclone Disturbance in a Coastal Freshwater Wetland
14.30pm PDT Lin Xiong @Dr_Lin_XIONG Quantifying mangrove forest canopy regrowth after a major hurricane with multiple, large-scale repeat G-LiHT airborne Lidar
14.40pm PDT Laura Griffiths @oceangriffiths Metabolomic indicators for low-light stress in seagrass
14.50pm PDT Jillian Dunic @jdunic Long-term declines and recovery of meadow area across the world’s seagrass bioregions

Session three was held 9.00am – Noon BST, 27 October 2021
To view the Twitter presentations, click the title below.

TIME PRESENTER TWITTER HANDLE TITLE
9.00am BST Lina Mtwana Nordlund @ResearchLina Seagrass ecosystem services
9.10am BST Save Our Mangroves Now! @MangrovesNow #RootsofHope – why we need mangroves for a sustainable blue economy
9.20am BST Amrit Kumar Mishra @SeagrasEcology Ecological connectivity between seagrass and mangrove ecosystems and influence on carbon storage
9.30am BST Yota Harada @haradaoceans A new tracer technology to quantify blue carbon dynamics
9.40am BST Sophie Russell @sophkaterussell Assessing drivers of variability in blue carbon soil stocks
9.50am BST Radhika Bhargava @radb06 Previous shoreline dynamics impact future susceptibility to loss of mangroves during an extreme weather event – case study from Sundarbans
10.00am BST Anwesha Ghosh @Anweghosh Litterfall induced changes in bacterioplankton communities of Sundarbans
10.10am BST BREAK
10.20am BST Christina Buelow @ChristinABuelow Global opportunities for conserving vegetated coastal wetlands
10.30am BST Chris Brown @bluecology Filling gaps in recognition of coastal wetlands in global ecosystem assessments
10.40am BST Yasmine Gatt @Yasmine_Gatt Quantifying the reporting, coverage and consistency of key indicators in mangrove restoration projects
10.50am BST Thomas Worthington @T_A_Worthington Mangrove restoration potential: A global map highlighting a critical opportunity
11.00am BST Pushpak Baviskar @Theehearty Mapping spatial and temporal distribution of mangrove forests in the coastal city of Mumbai
11.10am BST Carmen Danae Azor @carmendanae The Degradation of Ramsar Sites in the Dominican Republic
11.20am BST César Herrara @CexyNature Biodiversity beyond species census: assessing organisms’ traits and functional attributes using computer vision
11.30am BST Nathan Waltham @WalthamNathan Future of coastal wetlands on the Great Barrier Reef
11.40am BST Break
11.50am BST Anusha Rajkaran @AnushaRajkaran The impact of heavy metals and microplastics on the provision of ecosystem services by coastal habitats

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

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Lina Mtwana Nordlund
Associate Senior Lecturer, Uppsala University

Presentation: Seagrass ecosystem services

Dr Lina Mtwana Nordlund is an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary scientist grounded in social-ecological theory and applied environmental sciences. She has a strong interest in sustainable coastal development with a focus on seagrass ecosystems, small-scale fisheries, ecosystem services, management and governance. Her research is conducted in Sweden, the Indo-Pacific and around the world.

Lina is the Director of the Indo-Pacific Seagrass Network, an interdisciplinary research network focusing on seagrass-associated fisheries. She is an associate Senior Lecturer at Uppsala University, Sweden and teaches about sustainable futures and coastal zone development.

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Michael Sievers
Research Fellow, Griffith University

Presentation: Global typologies of coastal wetland status

Dr Michael Sievers is a marine ecologist at the Global Wetlands Project, Griffith University. He is working to drive scientific understanding of critical issues facing coastal ecosystems and building online tools to help address these issues more effectively and efficiently. As of 2022, he will begin an Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Research Award (DECRA) to better understand the relationships between plants and animals within restored coastal ecosystems. By focusing on a more animal-centric point of view, he hopes to improve restoration outcomes for wildlife and society.

Throughout his current work Michael has been adopting artificial intelligence techniques to enhance environmental monitoring. He plans to continue this as part of the DECRA. Before coming to Griffith University in 2018, his previous work centred around evaluating the ecological costs and benefits of artificial wetlands in urban landscapes, with a focus on ecological trap theory, ecotoxicology, metapopulation dynamics and urban ecology. His other area of expertise is aquaculture, primarily understanding the impact of biofouling and how to mitigate this impact and minimise animal welfare concerns in salmon farming.

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Kerrylee Rogers
Associate Professor, University of Wollongong

Presentation: Coastal ecosystems are highly dynamic and global change models need your local-scale data

Associate Professor Kerrylee Rogers is a coastal geomorphologist/geographer at the University of Wollongong School of Earth, Atmospheric and Life Sciences. Experience in government and academia means her research is applied, and focuses on providing real-world solutions. Understanding the response of coastal ecosystems and landscapes to climate change is a core research interest. Attention is placed on the role of sea level in shaping coastal ecosystems, with mineral sediment and substrate organic matter addition being a critical process providing dual benefits of facilitating adaptation to sea-level rise, and contributing towards climate change mitigation.

In addition to her research, she leads an Asia-Pacific Regional project with the International Atomic Energy Agency focussed on building country capacity in the application of radiometric and isotopic techniques for assessing the vulnerability of coasts to sea-level rise. In her role as ‘Environmental Science’ academic program director and GeoQuest Research Centre director at UOW, she shares her passion for coastal sustainability with undergraduate and postgraduate students.

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Anusha Rajkaran
Senior Lecturer, University of the Western Cape

Presentation: The impact of heavy metals and microplastics on the provision of ecosystem services by coastal habitats

Dr Anusha Rajkaran received her training from the Nelson Mandela University (formerly known as University of Port Elizabeth). She has been trained in the field of Botany and Estuarine Ecology. Her Honours, Masters and PhD focussed on different aspects of mangrove forest ecology; the methods, impacts and patterns of resource utilization of mangrove species in the Eastern Cape region gave rise to her first scientific papers. The PhD thesis entitled: A status assessment of mangrove forests in South Africa and the utilization of mangroves at Mngazana Estuary produced four scientific papers and a book chapter and increased her exposure to scientists in the Western Indian Ocean (WIO), Australia and Belgium. After the completion of her PhD, Anusha was appointed to the Department of Botany at Rhodes University from October 2011 to November 2015. In December of 2015, Anusha joined the Department of Biodiversity and Conservation Biology at the University of the Western Cape.

Anusha’s research has expanded to the functioning of other estuarine habitats such as salt marsh and seagrass, provision of ecosystem services, establishing baseline estimates of microplastic and chemical pollutants and establishing indicators of health of habitats in South Africa. Her research covers most parts of the South African coastline and the research team includes honours, MSc and PhD students as well as PostDoctoral fellows.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

A Twitter conference is a virtual event where presenters following a conference schedule and deliver their presentations by tweets.

Participants can view or engage with the tweets through accessing these from each presenter’s page or following posts that include the conference hashtag.

For this Twitter conference, the Global Wetlands Project will use the Twitter account @globalwetlands and the conference hashtag #CWTC21.

Presenters will deliver their presentations using 5 tweets from their own personal or their organisations Twitter accounts.
Learn more at Twitter help centre: Find out how to tweet

Participants who would like to reply with comments, questions, like or re-share tweets will need a Twitter account.
Learn more at Twitter help centre: Find out how to use mentions and replies

Participating in real-time can allow stronger interaction through commenting or asking questions of the presenters. You can also interact with other participants who are engaging with the presentations at the same time.

The tweets made during the conference presentations, like any tweet, will be available to access via presenters twitter handles afterwards (unless the tweets are deleted). If you are unable to attend in real-time, make sure you have a look at the presenter’s twitter handles to see and engage with the presentations.

The conference will have two sessions to accomodate participants in different time zones.

You are encouraged to promote your participation in the conference on Twitter, other social media or communication channels you use. On Twitter, please include the conference hashtag #CWTC21 and tag The Global Wetlands Project account @globalwetlands

Once you have been confirmed as a presenter, you will be sent an individual image file via email that you can use specifically to promote your presentation.

During the conference, The Global Wetlands Project from @globalwetlands will post a tweet five minutes before your presentation starts directing participants to your twitter account using your twitter handle.

Using the conference hashtag #CWTC21 at the start of each presentation tweet will allow participants to search and find your tweets.

If you have further questions please contact Natasha Watson at The Global Wetlands Project via email: n.watson@griffith.edu.au