Long-term monitoring of macroalgal biodiversity in Stanley Park, Vancouver, British Columbia

Starting in September 2025, Evan Kohn, who has been very involved with the transects since 2023, is now co-leading the project. Macroalgae are marine foundation species in intertidal ecosystems, but data regarding their historical abundance, diversity, and phenology remains lacking in many regions, including British Columbia.

This absence of historical baselines may hinder assessments of how macroalgae are affected by anthropogenic stressors, such as extreme weather events (e.g., 2021 heat dome) or invasive species. Obtaining baseline data may be especially important for urban intertidal zones, where the impact of increasing anthropogenic stressors is underappreciated. To fill this data gap, they started a collaborative long-term survey in 2021 to document year-round macroalgal biodiversity in a highly biodiverse urban intertidal zone around the Girl in a Wetsuit Statue in Stanley Park, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada (49.30275394688415, -123.12643462372476).