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SD public defense duties shift from counties to state; SCOTUS appears skeptical of restricting government communications with social media companies; Trump lawyers say he can't make bond; new scholarships aim to connect class of 2024 to high-demand jobs.

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The SCOTUS weighs government influence on social media, and who groups like the NRA can do business with. Biden signs an executive order to advance women's health research and the White House tells Israel it's responsible for the Gaza humanitarian crisis.

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Midwest regenerative farmers are rethinking chicken production, Medicare Advantage is squeezing the finances of rural hospitals and California's extreme swing from floods to drought has some thinking it's time to turn rural farm parcels into floodplains.

FL Researchers Study Links Between Prey Fish, Predators and Algal Blooms

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Friday, June 11, 2021   

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- For the most part, if you're a fish, you're either prey or predator, but Florida research is finding the symbiotic relationship is at risk after outbreaks of harmful algal blooms.

Dakota Lewis, a graduate student at the University of Central Florida (UCF) and a 2020 fellow in the Forage Fish Research Program, has studied algal blooms and fish kills in the Indian River Lagoon, which stretches along 40% of Florida's East Coast.

Using data sets from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and a new computer-modeling framework, she found faster declines of forage fish, like mullet and anchovies, after an algal bloom, and years of decline for fish-eating species, like trout and redfish.

"And so, there's a potential for a loss of that balance, due to that decoupling of those two communities that are so intertwined and, in the food web, related to one another," Lewis outlined.

Lewis thinks shifts in community dynamics for forage fish and sport fish could have harmful effects on popular recreational fisheries, now and in the long term. Lewis' research is published in the journal Ecological Indicators.

Emily Farrell, another UCF graduate student, uses an emerging new genetic technique, known as environmental DNA or 'eDNA,' to help get a high-resolution snapshot of the marine ecosystem in the lagoon.

"The dust in our houses is mostly shed skin cells; that would be environmental DNA," Farrell explained. "But in a fisheries context, it's mucus or scales, or other things that fish are releasing into the water by swimming through it."

Farrell's method can account for even the smallest species, like forage fish, simply by collecting seawater samples along the lagoon. The eDNA analysis will help create a map of local biodiversity hotspots.

The Forage Fish Research Program is a public-private partnership between Florida Wildlife Research Institute, leading academics and a coalition led by the International Game Fish Association.

Support for this reporting was provided by The Pew Charitable Trusts.


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Corporate partners sign contracts to offer a graduate assistantship and pay the students. In turn, MSU pays the graduate assistant's tuition, fees and salary, so the assistantship is directly tied to the academic experience. (pressmaster/Adobe Stock)

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