| Assessment | Usually a one time effort to determine the condition, species composition, or distribution of seagrass in a specific area. This is usually conducted as a reconnaissance effort to document baseline conditions or to determine the impacts of a major event, such as a hurricane or pollutant spill, on a specific seagrass meadow. |
| Buoys/Signs | When a specific seagrass meadow has been subjected to significant damage from boating activity, it can be protected from further damage and be given a chance to recover by prohibiting the operation of motor boats in that area. To alert boaters not to enter these areas, buoys and signs are put in place around the damaged seagrass meadow. |
| Education | A broad range of activities can be considered educational. These activities are all meant to inform the as to public why seagrass is so important and to suggest things that the public can do to protect seagrass. Examples include classroom activities, nature center activities, brochures, displays, and presentations. |
| Enforcement | When police officers are specifically enforcing laws meant to protect seagrass. This most commonly occurs at motor boat exclusion areas, parks or sanctuaries where stricter laws have been enacted for the protection of seagrass, wildlife and other natural resources. |
| Funding | These are programs that are in the business of providing grants to help fund seagrass or other natural resource conservation efforts. |
| Land Acquisition | The purchase of land for the creation of conservation easements along a shoreline or within a watershed to protect the quality of adjacent waters where seagrass grows. |
| Mapping | The creation of maps that show the distribution of seagrass throughout a particular area. |
| Monitoring | The use of field techniques to keep watch on the condition of specific seagrass meadows or a range of meadows within an estuary. |
| Mooring Field | The installation of buoys to which boats can tie up to rather than using their anchors. This practice protects sensitive seagrass, corals and other live bottom habitats from being damaged by boat anchors. |
| Planning | When a management authority puts together a written blueprint of how it will conduct its business in order to conserve, protect or restore seagrass. |
| Regulation | Many shoreline construction activities directly impact seagrass, and governments have been granted authority to oversee these activities in order to minimize negative impacts to seagrass and other natural resources. Such programs include the oversight of the construction of docks, marinas, seawalls, pipelines, bridges, dredging of navigation channels and similar construction activities. |
| Restoration | Re-establishing a seagrass meadow in an area after one was destroyed. Restoration projects can occur when the water quality of a polluted area has been cleaned up, or after major storms, pollutant spills, or ship groundings damage a seagrass meadow. Restoration is often connected with the permitting of a construction activity that will destroy a seagrass meadow. When one seagrass meadow is destroyed, another is created to minimize negative impacts to the surrounding ecosystem (mitigation). If the situation permits, the seagrass meadow is restored in the same location. |
| Signage | The installation of informational signs at boat ramps, marinas or public boat docks. These signs alert boaters to the presence of seagrass in the area, inform them as to why seagrass is so important, and to suggest things that the boater can do to protect seagrass while boating in the area. |
| Transplanting | The transfer of seagrass plants from one locality that has plenty of seagrass, or from a plant nursery, to another locality where seagrass is sparse in hope that they will grow to form a new seagrass meadow. This practice is used quite often for both restoration and mitigation. Mitigation is connected with the permitting of a construction activity that will destroy a seagrass meadow. Many times seagrass plants that are moved from a location that is about to be impacted by construction activities to an adjacent area where they can hopefully reestablish themselves as a seagrass meadow. |
