Salt marshes provide important economic and ecologic services but are vulnerable to habitat loss, particularly due to shoreline erosion from storms and sea level rise. Sediments eroded at the marsh edge are either delivered onto the marsh platform or into the estuary, the latter resulting in a net loss to the marsh sediment budget and released soil carbon.
A Changing Marsh: The Past, Present, and Future of Grand Bay
Detailed Description
Researchers with the [U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center (SPCMSC) have been working within the Grand Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve and Grand Bay National Wildlife Refuge to track how marsh shorelines are changing over time, study how sediment moves between the marsh and the estuary, and predict how the marsh is responding to sea-level rise.
Coastal marshes and estuaries like those at Grand Bay are very important as they provide habitat for fish and wildlife, cleanse polluted waters and recharging groundwater aquifers, store carbon from the atmosphere, and help mitigate the effects of sea-level rise and storm impacts.
Learn more about Estuarine and Marsh Geology research.
References Cited:
Alizad, K., Hagen, S.C., Medeiros, S.C., Bilskie, M.V., Morris, J.T., Balthis, L., et al., 2018, Dynamic responses and implications to coastal wetlands and the surrounding regions under sea level rise: PLoS ONE, 13(10), e0205176, accessed September 12, 2022 at: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0205176.
Smith, K.E.L., Terrano, J.F., Khan, N.S., Smith, C.G., Pitchford, J.L., 2021, Lateral shoreline erosion and shore-proximal sediment deposition on a coastal marsh from seasonal, storm and decadal measurements: Geomorphology, v. 389, accessed September 12, 2022 at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2021.107829.
Any use of trade, firm, logos, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.
Details
00:03:25
Sources/Usage
Public Domain.
Video as produced by USGS is public domain.
Video Credits:
“No Title” (Marsh flyover clip) by Roman Skrypnyk from Pexels.com
“Video Of Wetlands” by Dave Clark from Pexels.com
“Tall Grasses on a Swamp” by Diana Smykova from Pexels.com
“A Drone Video of a Marsh Landscape” by Thomas Farlow from Pexels.com
Music Credits:
“Bumbling” by Pictures of the Floating World from Free Music Archive
“Creative Minds” by Ben Sound from BenSound.com
Videos used with permission from Michael Archer, Glen (Michael) Brochard, Jonathan Pitchford, and Matthew Virden.
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Estuarine Shoreline Change Research Project
The goal of the estuarine shoreline change project is to define shoreline positions for historical and modern wetland shorelines and calculate rates of change along the U.S. East and Gulf coasts.
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Salt marshes provide important economic and ecologic services but are vulnerable to habitat loss, particularly due to shoreline erosion from storms and sea level rise. Sediments eroded at the marsh edge are either delivered onto the marsh platform or into the estuary, the latter resulting in a net loss to the marsh sediment budget and released soil carbon.
Mapped shoreline position from 1848 to 2014 overlaid on 2020 U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Aerial Imagery Program (NAIP) natural-color aerial imagery provide evidence of coastal wetland change over time
linkCoastal wetland shoreline position is mapped from historic and modern data sources, such as topographic sheets, aerial imagery, and satellite imagery. From these data, the shoreline change rate is determined from the date of the data source and the distance between each shoreline.
Mapped shoreline position from 1848 to 2014 overlaid on 2020 U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Aerial Imagery Program (NAIP) natural-color aerial imagery provide evidence of coastal wetland change over time
linkCoastal wetland shoreline position is mapped from historic and modern data sources, such as topographic sheets, aerial imagery, and satellite imagery. From these data, the shoreline change rate is determined from the date of the data source and the distance between each shoreline.
Rapid salt-marsh erosion in Grand Bay, Mississippi
This time-lapse video shows lateral erosion of a salt marsh in the Grand Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, part of an embayment near the city of Pascagoula, Mississippi, on the US Gulf coast. Wave action over the course of 6.5 months led to about 1.5 meters of erosion.
This time-lapse video shows lateral erosion of a salt marsh in the Grand Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, part of an embayment near the city of Pascagoula, Mississippi, on the US Gulf coast. Wave action over the course of 6.5 months led to about 1.5 meters of erosion.