Estuary Degradation. An Estuary is a partially enclosed body of water along the coast where fresh water from streams mixes with salt water from Oceans. Transitions of land to sea and fresh water to salt water.
What are the effects of destroying estuaries?
Destroying the estuary also creates the conditions for flooding. Estuaries provide a natural barrier to ocean waves, which can erode the shoreline and destroy coastal homes and businesses. Jakarta is particularly at risk for tsunami damage, as the area experiences frequent earthquakes.
What is an estuary in geography?
An estuary is an area where a freshwater river or stream meets the ocean. In estuaries, the salty ocean mixes with a freshwater river, resulting in brackish water. Brackish water is somewhat salty, but not as salty as the ocean. An estuary may also be called a bay, lagoon, sound, or slough. Water continually circulate s into and out of an estuary.
What happens when an estuary is flooded with saltwater?
The estuary shrinks, and becomes much more saline. During a storm season, storm surge s and other ocean waves may flood the estuary with saltwater. Most estuaries, however, are protected from the ocean's full force. Geographical features such as reef s, islands, mud, and sand act as barriers from ocean waves and wind.
What are the effects of coastal degradation?
Diminished and degraded habitats are less available to support healthy populations of wildlife and marine organisms. Additionally, they are less able to perform the economic, environmental and aesthetic functions that coastal populations depend on for their livelihoods and protection.
What are the effects of estuary degradation?
Diminished and degraded habitats are less available to support healthy populations of wildlife and marine organisms. Additionally, they are less able to perform the economic, environmental and aesthetic functions that coastal populations depend on for their livelihoods and protection.
What are the effects of wetland and estuary degradation?
The degradation, removal, and replacement of estuarine wetlands contribute to increased concentrations of zoonotic pathogens in coastal waters, where they can accumulate and pose significant health risks to wildlife and humans.
What is the cause of destruction of estuaries?
The greatest threat to estuaries is, by far, their large-scale conversion by draining, filling, damming, or dredging. These activities result in the immediate destruction and loss of estuarine habitats.
How can we fix estuary degradation?
Help plant trees or seagrass, or remove invasive vegetation. Don't litter: streets and storm drains empty into rivers and streams that drain into our estuaries. Pick up your pet's waste. Do not dump petroleum products, including oil, down storm drains; recycle used motor oil.
What is wetland degradation?
Degraded wetland means a wetland in which the vegetation, soils and/or hydrology have been adversely altered, resulting in lost or reduced functional value.
What are 3 major causes of degradation and loss of wetlands?
Major Causes of Wetlands Loss and DegradationDrainage.Dredging and stream channelization.Deposition of fill material.Diking and damming.Tilling for crop production.Levees.Logging.Mining.More items...•
How do estuaries affect the environment?
Climate Implications – Estuaries Salt marshes and mangrove forests are two habitats associated with estuaries. Estuaries filter pollutants and excess sediment, and they stabilize shorelines and protect coastal areas, inland habitats and human communities from floods and storm surges from hurricanes.
What are two threats affecting estuaries?
The health of our estuaries is threatened by coastal development, declining water quality and loss of habitat for native species. Estuaries are impacted by pressures from human activities as well as natural events such as storms and floods.
How do humans pollute estuaries?
Estuaries can easily become polluted due to industrial waste and agricultural and horticultural run-off. Stormwater run-off – such as in this Auckland estuary – can potentially lead to pollution and sedimentation.
Why is it important to protect estuaries?
Because they are biologically productive, estuaries provide ideal areas for migratory birds to rest and refuel during their long journeys. Because many species of fish and wildlife rely on the sheltered waters of estuaries as protected spawning places, estuaries are often called the "nurseries of the sea."
Why are estuaries vulnerable to the effects of pollution?
Bays and estuaries are more vulnerable to the effects of nutrient pollution because they are often shallow, narrow or confined, which limits the opportunity for water to circulate oxygen to the plants and animals.
What is the leading pollutant of estuary impairment?
EPA reports that nutrient pollution is the leading cause of water quality impairment in lakes and estuaries, and is the second leading cause in rivers (EPA, 1998a).
Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Program (APNEP)
Submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) is a critical resource for aquatic life because it:
Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program (BTNEP)
Grand Isle is Louisiana’s biggest and only inhabited barrier island. The forests, back barrier marshes and sandy beaches of Grand Isle are considered one of the premiere birding destinations in North America. Restoration efforts in the area aim to restore and enhance bird habitat on the barrier island, which is part of the Mississippi Flyway.
Coastal Bend Bays and Estuaries Program (CBBEP)
One of CBBEP's highest priorities is the protection and restoration of habitat for critical species. The CBBEP has an intensive focus on the purchase of major land parcels that provide increased high-quality acreage for waterbird nesting and shorebird habitat.
Galveston Bay Estuary Program (GBEP)
The GBEP’s habitat conservation partnership plans and executes expansive habitat restoration efforts. Since 2000, GBEP and partners have created, protected and enhanced over 20,585 acres of important coastal habitats, leveraging $78 million in local, industry, state and federal contributions.
Maryland Coastal Bays Program (MCBP)
The MCBP and its partners reclaimed a sand mine by converting its 32-acres into an Atlantic white cedar wetland, a once very common ecological habitat type which is now virtually non-existent in Maryland. Restoration projects like this provide a variety of benefits.
Mobile Bay National Estuary Program (Mobile Bay NEP)
The Mobile Bay NEP (Alabama) partnered with the Baldwin County Commission to prevent on-site erosion and restore wetland, riparian and stream habitat in Magnolia Springs Park.
Morro Bay National Estuary Program (Morro Bay NEP)
The Morro Bay NEP (located in California) and its partners improved fish passage in streams by removing man-made structures that impeded fish migration upstream. Their work resulted in enhanced access to 6.29 miles of stream for steelhead and other species.
What happens to the water level in an estuary?
In estuaries, water level and salinity rise and fall with the tides. These features also rise and fall with the seasons. During the rainy season, rivers may flood the estuary with freshwater. During the dry season, the outflow from rivers may slow to a trickle. The estuary shrinks, and becomes much more saline.
What happens to the estuary during a storm?
The estuary shrinks, and becomes much more saline. During a storm season, storm surge s and other ocean waves may flood the estuary with saltwater. Most estuaries, however, are protected from the ocean's full force. Geographical features such as reef s, islands, mud, and sand act as barriers from ocean waves and wind.
What type of estuary is Puget Sound?
Fjord estuaries (4) are a type of estuary created by glaciers. Fjord estuaries occur when glaciers carve out a deep, steep valley. Glaciers retreat and the ocean rushes into fill the narrow, deep depression. Puget Sound is a series of fjord estuaries in the U.S. state of Washington.
How are freshwater estuaries created?
These freshwater estuaries are created when a river flows into a freshwater lake. Although freshwater estuaries are not brackish, the chemical composition of lake and river water is distinct. River water is warmer and less dense than lake water.
What is a bar built estuary?
When a lagoon or bay is protected from the ocean by a sandbar or barrier island, it is called a bar-built estuary (3). The Outer Banks, a series of narrow barrier islands in North Carolina and Virginia, create sandy, bar-built estuaries.
What are the nutrients in estuaries?
The calm waters provide a safe area for small fish, shellfish, migrating birds and shore animals. The waters are rich in nutrients such as plankton and bacteria. Decomposing plant matter, called detritus, provides food for many species.
Which river is the largest estuary in the world?
However, many scientists say that that St. Lawrence River, which connects the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean, is the world's largest estuary.
What are the natural disturbances in estuaries?
Natural disturbances include winds, tidal currents, waves, and ice.
What happens if a barrier beach is destroyed?
If these beaches are destroyed, salt marshes and inland habitats adjacent to the estuary may become permanently damaged. Waves can also dislodge plants and animals, or bury them with sediments, while objects carried by the water can crush them.
What is dead floating plant material called?
Dead floating plant material, called wrack, is often deposited on salt marshes by high spring tides. Wracks can be quite large—up to hundreds of square meters, and up to 30 centimeters thick. If these wracks are deposited in the high marsh, they often become stranded, smothering all of the plant life beneath them.
Can ice freeze in an estuary?
Ice can freeze on an estuary’s shoreline, or float freely in the water. When slabs of free-floating ice make contact with the shore, they have a scouring effect, dislodging and killing the plants and shoreline animals that lie in their path.
Is a natural habitat stable?
We like to think of natural places as being stable over time, but, in fact, they are not . Natural habitats are continually disturbed by natural processes, followed by periods of recovery. When a natural disturbance is followed by an anthropogenic disturbance or vice versa, a habitat may become so damaged that it never recovers.
Introduction
Estuaries rank among the most productive ecosystems on earth, but they are also subject to considerable ecological degradation associated with the loss and alteration of habitats and impairment of water quality due to multiple anthropogenic and natural drivers of change (Kennish, 2002; Kennish et al ., 2008; Aubrey and Elliott, 2006).
Restoration Defined
The term "restoration" as applied to estuarine ecosystems has varying connotations. Some investigators view restoration in the strictest sense as the return of an ecosystem to an exact pre-existing condition following degradation or disruption.
Restoration Success
Palmer (2009) contends that despite great management efforts and significant investments to restore estuaries and watersheds, many continue to be degraded.
Recovery Rate
Restoration of the ecological structure and function of a damaged estuarine system requires considerable time depending on the type and severity of the human pressure, the kind of habitat, the geographic location of the impacted system, and other factors. Craft et al.
Legislative Action
Legislative action has been taken in different countries which incorporates restoration of degraded estuarine and marine habitats as a major target (Borja et al., 2008). The Clean Water Act in the U.S. as well as the Water Framework Directive and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive in Europe provide examples.
Conclusions
The restoration of estuaries is fraught with pitfalls because of the vagaries of environmental conditions, difficulties differentiating and addressing human and natural-induced impacts, and the financial cost to achieve successful habitat and ecosystem recovery.
What are the threats to estuaries?
The greatest threat to estuaries is, by far, their large-scale conversion by draining, filling, damming, or dredging. These activities result in the immediate destruction and loss of estuarine habitats. Until the last few decades, many estuary habitats in North America were drained and converted into agricultural areas;
What are the pollutants that affect estuaries?
The pollutants that have the greatest impact on the health of estuaries include toxic substances like chemicals and heavy metals, nutrient pollution (or eutrophication), and pathogens such as bacteria or viruses .
What are the problems caused by algal blooms?
Toxic algal blooms disrupt tourism due to foul odors and unsightly views, and poisoned fish and shellfish adversely affect recreational and commercial fisheries. Nutrient pollution is the single largest pollution problem affecting coastal waters of the United States.
How much does it cost to control purple loosestrife?
Today it has invaded estuaries in 48 states, crowding out 44 species of native plants. Controlling purple loosestrife costs about $45 million a year.
Why is pollution important in estuaries?
Pollution is probably the most important threat to water quality in estuaries. Poor water quality affects most estuarine organisms, including commercially important fish and shellfish.
Why are abandoned boats bad for marsh grass?
Abandoned and poorly maintained boats can leak pollutants and crush the life out of delicate marsh grasses. (Photo: Weeks Bay Reserve) Because they are transitional areas between the land and the sea, and between freshwater and saltwater environments, estuaries can be seriously impacted by any number of human, or anthropogenic, activities.
How do invasive species affect the environment?
Invasives often cause ecological damage and economic losses where they are introduced. Competing with native species for food, or preying upon native species, invasive species have drastically reduced the populations of native species and have, in some cases, caused their extinction.
