Biodiversity hot spot:
While not all organisms can directly digest the cellulose within the seagrass leaves, they provide complexity on the seabed that shelters small marine animals. A diverse array of epiphytes and tiny filter-feeding animals like sponges, hydroids and the eggs of sea squirts and molluscs attach onto the seagrass leaf blades. These provide food for small fish, which in turn provide food for larger fish. Detritus from bacterial decomposition of dead seagrass plants provides food for an assortment of marine worms, sea cucumbers, crabs and other filter feeders.
Habitat connectivity Alongside mangroves, seagrass support coral reefs by providing a vital nursery ground for a multitude of fish and crustacean species, absorbing pollutants, and reducing sedimentation of coastal waters.
Economic Value: Seagrass also provide vital nursery habitat for commercially important fish and prawns. Tiger prawns live in seagrass meadows from the post-larval stage (3–4 weeks) until they become adults, many endeavour prawns also spend their juvenile stage within the seagrasses. Together these species have an average annual landed value of $1.2 million in the Cairns area alone, according to the QLD government.