SMAST Seminar - DEOS - September 23, 2026 - "Weighing a Forest from Orbit: Estimating Kelp Biomass, Production, and Modeling Harvest" by: Tom Bell
SMAST East 101-103
: 836 S. Rodney French Boulevard, New Bedford MA 02744
Callie Rumbut
c.rumbut@umassd.edu
https://umassd.zoom.us/j/97440069270
Seminar Announcement
Department of Estuarine and Ocean Sciences
"Weighing a Forest from Orbit: Estimating Kelp Biomass, Production, and Modeling Harvest"
Tom Bell
Associate Professor, Estuarine and Ocean Sciences, SMAST
Wednesday, September 23, 2026
12:30 - 1:30 pm
SMAST E 101-103 and via Zoom
Abstract:
California is replacing statewide kelp harvest rules with regional, biomass-based quotas under its new Kelp Restoration and Management Plan. After a brief history of how and why kelp is harvested and what is known about its impacts, this talk covers a California Ocean Protection Council-funded project that supplies the numbers the nascent statewide plan needs: satellite estimates of bull kelp biomass calibrated with centimeter-scale drone imagery, hole-punch measurements showing that bull kelp replaces its blades several times a season, and an environment-driven model of forty+ years of Landsat canopy that we are extending to forecast harvestable kelp and to detect harvest and herbivore impacts. I close with describing the Kelp Advanced Warning Systems (KAWS), a new NASA-funded platform that will deliver these products to managers.
Join Meeting
https://umassd.zoom.us/j/97440069270
Note: Meeting ID and passcode required, email contact to obtain.
For additional information, please contact Callie Rumbut at c.rumbut@umassd.edu