Marine scientists have begun to recognize that the soundscapes of marine habitats – that is, all the sounds emanating from a specific habitat – are vital components of healthy, functioning ecosystems. In our study, we recorded and analyzed the soundscapes of the three dominant habitats of Florida Bay, FL (USA): the submerged prop-roots of mangrove fringed islands, seagrass beds, and hard-bottom. Comparing the soundscapes of these habitats, we found that mangrove islands and hard-bottom habitats were louder than and exhibited more snapping shrimp snaps than seagrass beds. Furthermore, we compared recordings of hard-bottom habitat degraded by algal blooms and recordings of hard-bottom habitat undergoing active habitat restoration efforts to recordings of healthy hard-bottom habitat, and found that degraded hard-bottom was much quieter than healthy hard-bottom; however, our restoration areas sounded similar to healthy areas, meaning our efforts to restore degraded hard-bottom help those soundscapes to recover as well.
