The Climate Project: Planting seagrass

The Climate Project: Seagrass

Seagrasses are our ocean superheroes. Seagrass meadows trap carbon within the seabed and, if left undisturbed, it is stored there for millennia. They reduce pathogens and pollutants in our water and their large, deep network of roots extend throughout the seabed, helping to stabilise our coastlines and reduce coastal erosion. Seagrass meadows are havens of biodiversity, providing habitat, food, and shelter to thousands of species of fish, invertebrates, mammals, reptiles, and birds. As important fishing grounds, seagrass meadows provide access to food sources and support the livelihoods of millions of people, with 20% of the world’s largest fisheries dependant on seagrasses.

The BMC is working with Seagrass Ocean Rescue, a programme from Project Seagrass, to spread awareness of this special habitat and bring it back to our Welsh waters.

Why protect seagrass?

There are two true seagrass species in the UK that form incredible, dense underwater meadows. These meadows host thousands of marine species, including our two native seahorses! Seagrass provides food, shelter and breeding grounds for larger species like catsharks and turtles, and smaller species like whelks, starfish and anemones.

Did you know that seagrasses are one of our most important natural solutions to the climate crisis?

Seagrasses sequester, or capture, carbon dissolved in our seas and despite only covering 0.1% of the seafloor, seagrass meadows are responsible for storing up to 18% of the world’s oceanic carbon. In fact, carbon is taken from the water and used to build the seagrass’ leaves and roots – once the plants die, the carbon can then be stored in the seafloor for thousands of years.

Unfortunately, we have lost up to 92% of British seagrass meadows in the past 100 years, mainly through disease and human-induced poor water quality. Globally, it is estimated that the equivalent size of two football pitches of seagrass is lost every hour.

Seagrass Ocean Rescue

Protecting what seagrass is left in Wales is essential. The Seagrass Ocean Rescue project - a collaboration between North Wales Wildlife Trust, Project Seagrass, WWF, Swansea University and Pen Llŷn A’r Sarnau SAC and funded by several funders including the National Lottery Heritage Fund - is aiming to do just that!

The exciting project engages with volunteers, local community groups and stakeholders to get involved with some hands-on seagrass restoration work in North Wales. In August 2023, hundreds of thousands of tiny seagrass seeds were hand collected at one of the UK’s largest seagrass meadows in Porthdinllaen on the Llŷn Peninsula! These seeds will then be cleaned and processed in Swansea University’s laboratories, before returning to North Wales to be prepped and planted by staff and volunteers in specially chosen sites!

In 2023 Project Seagrass picked 1.5 million seeds which were planted across restoration sites in North Wales and at their nursery. In 2024, 1.2 million seeds were picked. Plans are currently underway to plant these seeds out alongside nursery grown transplants in spring 2025. Seed collection is also planned for this year, where the Seagrass Ocean Rescue project aims to collect a similar amount of seeds to the previous two years.

Let’s plant more

Our current Cotswold Outdoor Pennies campaign for The Climate Project will raise funds for Seagrass Ocean Rescue. It costs £100 to plant one square metre of seagrass and create healthy marine meadows around the coastline of the UK.

Your donations will help:

• Actively fight climate change

• Avoid carbon loss

• Reduce flooding risk

• Protect endangered wildlife

• Preserve marine habitats

• Increase biodiversity

Your donation makes a huge impact:

• £5 buys a pair of work gloves
• £10 buys 10 hessian planting sacks
• £25 buys a seagrass seeder tool
• £50 buys a pair of mud shoes to reduce trampling impact
• £150 buys equipment to test water quality at site
• £250 buys a seed maturation cage to overwinter the seeds
• £1000 buys a drone survey to monitor growth

Dive into some seagrass volunteering

As well as the volunteering dates above, currently you can get involved with the Seagrass Ocean Rescue project by running your own self-led citizen science, by becoming an individual volunteer with Project Seagrass or by joining North Wales Wildlife Trust with your community group or society with regular site visits and hands-on opportunities available.

• Visit North Wales Wildlife Trust’s website and follow their social media channels to keep up to date with the Seagrass Ocean Rescue project
• Contact Project Seagrass at volunteers@projectseagrass.org to register as an individual volunteer or join the ‘Project Seagrass Volunteers’ Facebook Group to keep up to date with upcoming opportunities.

The Climate Project: Seagrass is a campaign by the BMC's Access and Conservation Trust. Working alongside North Wales Wildlife Trust.