Those dealing with Endgangered Species Act (ESA) listings and salmon recovery -- from tribes to local governments -- are finding that solutions are elusive without better knowledge of shoreline habitat or the extent to which nearshore vegetation should be protected.

 That=s why a gaggle of rubber boot-clad volunteers organized by the Point No Point Treaty Council (PNPTC) descended on eastern Strait of Juan de Fuca and Hood Canal beaches in June and July to collect data on nearshore vegetation. Their hands-on, painstaking work -- which included counting individual blades of eelgrass in sample plots -- is being combined with high resolution aerial photographs to develop a detailed inventory of shoreline resources.

 Counties are currently updating shoreline management plans in response to ESA, and the data collected should help in developing regulations to better protect shorelines and salmon habitat.

 AThe idea is to collect baseline data on nearshore habitat, for which we don=t really have much,@ said PNPTC habitat biologist Ted Labbe, lead coordinator for the study. ASome benefits of this huge effort may not be realized for 20 or 30 years until we have something to compare it to. But some will be immediate, because Shoreline Management Act regulations will be kicking in, and a critical piece in those is that jurisdictions will do inventories of shorelines.@

 As dozens of trained volunteers worked below,  a sea plane flying overhead aimed a fixed focal-length Compact Airborne Spectrographic Imager at the shoreline. In one pass, the sensor can record data from an 800-meter swath, using pixels with 1.5-meter resolution. The high tech equipment makes it possible to achieve fine-scale resolution over a large geographic scale.

 The field work will Aground truth@ the aerial imagery, with the combined information creating a set of map overlays charting types and distributions of nearshore vegetation, particularly eelgrass, along with descriptions and locations of shoreline structures such as docks, marinas and bulkheads.

 Volunteers took advantage of extremely low tides in late June and early July to count eelgrass shoots in random samples close to targets that could be spotted by the plane. Field work also included digitally photographing sample squares and fixing points with a Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) unit.

 The importance of eelgrass to Hood Canal summer chum salmon, which along with Puget Sound chinook were recently protected under ESA, sparked the study by PNPTC. Life history research into summer chum shows that juveniles entering saltwater for the first time feed on small invertebrates found in eelgrass beds. And to keep from becoming a meal themselves, young salmon hide in the beds from predators. Eelgrass beds also serve as a nursery for herring -- a favorite food of salmon -- which lay their eggs on the slender green blades.