Sea Oats & Dune Stabilization
 

So I now live on an island, and the erosion of the dunes on the beach by the ocean, especially during storms, is a constant issue. The town and the county spend a lot of money to "renourish" the beaches with sand from inland pits or the tailings from dredging the various inlets in the area, but it seems to me that anchoring the dunes better with sea oats is an essential part of keeping them in place.

To try to help that effort, I have started working with the town's public works department and their greenhouse manager, applying KelpMax to aid in both seed germination and growth.

Apparently sea oats branch a fair amount from rhizomes, and have very deep, fast-growing roots, and if my experience with sympodial orchids is any indication, both ought to be accelerated by application of KelpMax.

I'll keep you posted as this experiment progresses.

Ray, for this post, it might be good to add your botanical name. As you know there a couple different varieties.

Yes, it's has long rizomes. We used to plant starts with a broom stick. Picky about when its planted etc. It's of the few effective dune stabilizers so your experiment will be interesting.

The roots of plants do a great job of holding soil in place. Just dumping a root-bound potted plant shows this. Not much of the soil moves. If the sea oats grow very quickly and can get established before the storm season, your plan has a very good chance of working. You could also look for various trees and shrubs that tolerate salt water and your climate. Surprisingly, there are many that do. Good luck with your project!

Were there ever mangroves that far north?

Many times, the first thing people do when they move to a never-inhabited beach front, island, river and lake property is to cut down all the trees and get rid of the shrubbery so they can have a nice view and full access. When the roots finally rot away, nothing is left to keep the soil from washing away.

Beach sand is different from regular sandysoil. At least around the Lake, not much grows.

I'm just "along for the ride", to see if the KelpMax offers any advantage. All I've been told is Uniola paniculata .