Drawing upon experience using scenario planning to help local communities prepare for climate change in the Tijuana River Valley (Southern California), the project team will use the best available science to facilitate local dialogue addressing how climate change may impact the Kenai Peninsula. The project will engage regional leaders and community stakeholders to collaboratively develop plausible future planning scenarios based on a wide range of possible environmental responses to a changing climate. Ultimately this process and the resulting scenarios will help to inform area resource managers and land use planners as they lay the groundwork for future research, regulation, and development. Additionally, the project will document the process and lessons learned to further demonstrate the applicability of scenario planning across geographically distinct communities. This science transfer project was funded by NOAA through the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative to promote the use of science. It did not produce any new data.

Through the current project, the Chesapeake Bay-Virginia Reserve is building on the strengths of the previous years of CECB to extend the reach into Middlesex County, while developing an alumni program to support the program in Gloucester and Mathews. All three counties lie within a region experiencing relative rates of sea level rise greater than the global average. This science transfer project was funded by NOAA through the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative to promote the use of science. It did not produce any new data.

Blue carbon storage – carbon sequestration in coastal wetlands – can help coastal managers and policymakers achieve broader wetlands management, restoration, and conservation goals, in part by securing payment for carbon credits. Despite considerable interest in bringing wetland restoration projects to market, the transaction costs related to quantifying greenhouse gas fluxes and carbon storage in restored marsh has been a significant limiting factor to realizing these projects. The Waquoit Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve has been at the forefront of blue carbon research and end user engagement. Building on the efforts of a previous project, Bringing Wetlands to Market in Massachusetts, this project developed a verified and generalized model that can be used across New England and the mid-Atlantic East Coast to assess and predict greenhouse gas fluxes and potential wetland carbon across a wide environmental gradient using a small set of readily available data. Using this model, the project conducted a first-of-its-kind market feasibility assessment for the Herring River Restoration Project, one of the largest potential wetland restoration projects in New England. The project team developed targeted tools and education programs for coastal managers, decision makers, and teachers. These efforts have built an understanding of blue carbon and the capacity to integrate blue carbon considerations into restoration and management decisions.

Through this project, results will be transferred to a variety of end users and products and activities will be developed with end user feedback. Products include a publication in a high impact scientific journal, a short user-friendly summary of this publication, well-designed PowerPoint presentations for a variety of audiences, and a "do it yourself" tool so others can apply the novel marsh assessment approach to additional marshes. The marsh index scores will also be linked directly to recommended coastal adaptation strategies, thereby meeting a frequently stated need to synthesize data on wetland resilience in a way that is transparent, clear, and accessible to coastal managers. This science transfer project was funded by NOAA through the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative to promote the use of science. It did not produce any new data.

Risk communication skills are essential for coastal community leaders in order to effectively engage, educate, and trigger behavioral changes that improve resilience to coastal hazards. In the wake of Superstorm Sandy, the Jacques Cousteau National Estuarine Research Reserve and NOAA's Office for Coastal Management recognized this need and developed risk communication trainings and tools. This project extended that work by developing and hosting two-day risk communication workshops for coastal outreach professionals in four coastal communities. Each event included the Office for Coastal Management's general risk communication training and a technical assistance workshop specific to the needs of the local decision-making community. This science transfer project was funded by NOAA through the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative to promote the use of science. It did not produce any new data.

Coastal researchers, fishermen, fishery managers and educators teamed up to understand changes in shrimp populations in response to shifting environmental conditions in estuaries. The Project Shrimping has deep cultural and economic ties to the South Carolina and Georgia coasts, and the southeast US Atlantic coast region as a whole. However, over the past two decades, commercial shrimp landings have been highly variable. Fishery management agencies, extension offices, and several southeastern Reserves have identified the need to better understand how shrimp populations are responding to changing environmental conditions, including warmer winters and altered salinity regimes. To do this work, a diverse team with members from universities, fishery management agencies, fisheries extension offices, and Reserves came together to form the Lowcountry Shrimp Collaborative. The Lowcountry Shrimp Collaborative used a comprehensive approach to examine how environmental conditions in estuaries are affecting abundance and timing of shrimp populations throughout the region through examination of each stage of the shrimp life cycle. Together, the Collaborative: Analyzed and synthesized numerous ongoing, long-term (30+ years) datasets on multiple shrimp life history stages (postlarval, juvenile, sub-adult, adult, commercially harvested) and environmental conditions (water quality, including System-Wide Monitoring Program data); Conducted field sampling targeting shrimp and their prey in salt marsh creeks during spring and summer seasons, over two years, at three southeast Reserves; Ran controlled seawater laboratory experiments to understand the impacts of competition for limited resources between shrimp species during their overlapping periods of estuarine residency; and, Interviewed commercial shrimpers based in Georgia and South Carolina, to better understand historical changes in, and perceptions of environmental impacts on, the shrimp industry in the southeast US. The project found that estuarine water temperature is rising across the region, mainly driven by increases during winter months. Warming temperatures can alter the life histories of shrimp, including shifting body size, altering the timing of migratory cues, and modifying habitat use. These warmer temperatures are also resulting in longer shrimping seasons with shrimpers often able to continue harvesting well into January. These results were confirmed by observations shared by shrimpers, who joined for a project wrap-up event where the team presented results and engaged in lively discussions about research needs and opportunities for collaboration between researchers, managers, and the industry.

Healthy estuaries are vital to the economy of the Texas central coast, supporting the region’s multibillion-dollar fishing industry and growing tourist trade. Adequate supplies of freshwater are key to the productivity of these estuaries. However, as the regional population grew and the recent drought deepened, estuaries were receiving less freshwater.

This dataset consists of transcripts from two focus groups with science users (1st group) and science producers (2nd group) who were partners of the Northeast Climate Adaptation Science Center (CASC). The participants in the focus groups were science users and science producers identified by the Northeast CASC and recruited in collaboration with Cornell's Center for Conservation Social Sciences. A total of 9 individuals participated in the science users focus group, and 12 participated in the science producers focus group. The purpose of the focus groups was to understand the range of perspectives and experiences of CASC partners in relation to their work with the CASC. We attempted to include participants that represented a diversity of organizations and regions working with the CASC. Participants in the science users groups included representatives of agencies intended to benefit from the science produced by the CASC: Landscape Conservation Cooperatives, federal natural resource agencies, state fish and wildlife agencies, tribal organizations, and nongovernmental conservation organizations. Participants in the science producers focus group included researchers that had received research funding from the CASC. The focus groups consisted of semi-structured conversations guided by a series of open-ended questions and lasted approximately two hours. The questions were designed to explore how partners contributed to the work of the CASC and the factors that influenced the ability of the CASC to work with their partners. The specific question topics focused on: how participants have worked with the CASC, reasons for becoming involved with the CASC, benefits of involvement with the CASC, challenges to involvement, and what the CASC could do to promote even more benefits from involvement. Additionally, we specifically explored how the CASC contributed to the coproduction of science and the generation of actionable science, with questions about interactions between science producers and science users and the role of the CASC in connecting them.

Resilience dialogues are conversations that occur among people with diverse perspectives who have agreed to work together to increase community and ecological resilience. For over a decade, the National Estuarine Research Reserve System has been leading a new approach to collaborative science that brings together scientists, environmental managers, and community stakeholders to address pressing coastal issues. Conflict is a natural part of collaborative science as people with differing perspectives and values interact in new ways over complex and uncertain issues. While leading collaborative science projects, reserves and their partners have accumulated a wealth of knowledge about how to confront and manage conflict. The Resilience Dialogues project drew on this experience to identify four best practices for collaborative science. The project created a curriculum, case studies, and peer-to-peer trainings to share these successful collaboration techniques and build conflict mediation skills. Multiple in-person and virtual workshops for reserve staff established these best practices and contributed to the effectiveness of collaborative science projects within the reserve system, while the project’s resources brought this expertise to a wider audience of state agencies and coastal management partners. This science transfer project was funded by NOAA through the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative to promote the use of science. It did not produce any new data.