Notes Series for Oceanography
MARS 2202 by
John P. Wnek

oceanworld.tamu.edu
Coastal diagram with the area of nearshore and offshore productivity

http://www.usa-chamber.com/gulf-beaches/home.html

from NASA (SeaWIFS)

Rocky Coasts
Mountain Coasts Northern Boreal Coasts
Western Coasts U.S. Barrier Island Coast

/www.epa.gov/owow/estuaries/programs/se.htm

Basic Definition of Estuary – A water body where salt & freshwater mix
Technical Definition “A standing water body within the coastal region where there is a greater net inflow of freshwater than an influx of sea water”
J Wnek

• Lagoon – parallel to coast (i.e. Indian River
Lagoon, Florida) – Bar-Built Estuaries
• Coast Plain Estuary – erosion (i.e.
Chesapeake Bay and Pamlico Sound)
• Tectonic Estuary – faults (i.e. San
Francisco Bay)
• Fjord – glacier formation (i.e. Alaska,
British Columbia, Norway, Chile)\
• Delta- formed at mouth of a river (i.e. –
Mississippi Delta )

Sandy Hook, N.J.

Ocean City, Maryland

Aerial view of Oregon Inlet with highway 12- on
Hatteras Island, NC. (Mallison et al. 2009)

Geological sequence of sea level rise and the succession of
Pamlico
Sound
Mallison,
Riggs, Culver and Ames,
East Carolina
University,
2009

ONR.NAVY.MIL
San Francisco Bay Estuary – a tectonic estuary

Geiranger Fjord, Norway
Kejser Franz Joseph Fjord, Greenland

Kenai River Delta, Alaska

• Temperature
• Salinity
• Nutrients
Anthropogenic effects (review)
• Increased runoff
• Development causing habitat fragmentation
• Global Climatic Changes

• Temperatures may change with shifting tidal regimes
• There can be temperature inversions during the evenings, especially in the fall when cooler temperatures may be at the surface.

35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
•Key:
•Upwelling
•Nor’easter
Water Temperature C: Raniero Dock, Sedge Island
Cruz and Wnek, Summer 2012

• Nontidal Fresh 0 ppt, no tidal influence
• Tidal Fresh 0 - 1 ppt, tidal influence
• Oligohaline 2 - 5 ppt (slightly brackish)
• Mesohaline 8 - 15 ppt (brackish)
• Polyhaline 18 ppt and up (salt water)

• Salinity can vary in estuaries based upon the amount of salt water inflow and freshwater inputs.
• Estuaries can be classified according to the layering of salt water based on density
- well-mixed
- partially-mixed
- salt wedge (highly stratified)

• Some estuaries show an increase in salinity over time, these are considered
“inverse estuaries” or “negative estuaries.”
• There is a net increase in salinity over time mostly due to human impacts (i.e. dams and loss of freshwater flow into the system)

(Zedler et al. 2001)
Swan River Estuary, W.
Australia (Neira et al., 1992)

• Considered the amount of time in which all water is totally exchanged in an estuary
• Varies according to the estuary due to ocean access, freshwater runoff (called inflow) and depth of the estuary t
F
= V
F
/ R t
F is the flushing time
V f is the freshwater volume
R is the river discharge rate

Estuary Minimum Maximum Mean
Chesapeake
Bay, MD-VA
210 days
(Guo)
Delaware
Bay, DE-NJ
Barnegat
Bay, NJ
North River,
MA
24 days
(January
1995)
3 days
(Geyer)
74 days
(June/July
1995)
9 days
(Geyer)
100 days
(Delaware Estuary
Program)
49 days
(Guo)
Not determined

• High Marsh – Not flooded regularly with predominant Spartina patens and Phragmites
– Series of marsh pools at higher elevations
• Low Marsh – Floods regularly with Spartina alterniflora
– Creeks and ditches with sometimes tidal effects
– Support a higher density of finfish than SAV beds
(Sogard and Able 1991).

Marsh Zones (Jones and Strange 2006)

Coastal erosion in Norfolk in 1997

Delaware Bay and human impacts
In the past eighteen thousand years, sea level has risen one hundred meters
(three hundred feet), converting freshwater rivers into brackish estuaries (Donn,
Farrand, and Ewing 1962). The Delaware River is an Alluvial Plain

Delaware River Fluxes in Sea Level Rise
Hull, C.H.J. and J.G.Titus (eds). 1997. Greenhouse Effect, Sea Level Rise, and Salinity in the Delaware
Estuary.
. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Delaware River Basin Commission.

Hartig et al. 2002

Hartig et al. 2002

Proposed Bruun Model with changing sea level
Shifting of dunes and berms in response to sea level rise
Davidson-Arnott, R. 2005. Conceptual model of the effects of sea level rise on sandy coasts.
Journal of Coastal Research 21 (6): pp. 1166-1172.

Mallison,
Riggs, Culver and Ames,
East Carolina
University,
2009

Concentrations (mg/l except for pH) of major ionic constituents in sea water [natural or formulated with synthetic sea salts (35 g/l TDS)], dilute sea water (5 g/l TDS) and vertebrate extracellular fluid (ECF) -
- adapted from Wurts and Stickney, 1989, Aquaculture , 76: 21-35.
Ions Sea water 1
(35 g/l TDS)
Sodium 10685
Potassium 396
Calcium 410
Magnesium 1287
Chloride 19215
Bicarbonate 142
Sulfate 2511 pH
1 Gross (1977).
7.8-8.4
2 Guyton (1971).
Dilute sea water
(5 g/l TDS)
1526
57
59
184
2745
20
359
7.8-8.4
ECF 2
(9 g/l TDS)
3265
195
100
36
3652
1708
48
7.4

Able, K, D.A. Witting, R. McBride, R. Rountree, and K.J. Smith. 1996. Fishes of polyhaline estuarine shores in
Great Bay-Little Egg Harbor, New Jersey: a case study of seasonal and habitat influences in Estuarine
Shores by K.F. Nordstrom and C.T. Roman (eds.). John Wiley and Sons, England: pp. 335-353.
Candolin, U., T. Salesto, and M. Evers. Changed environmental conditions weaken sexual selection in sticklebacks. 2006.
The Authors: Journal Compilation in the European Society for Evolutionary Biology 20: pp. 233- 239.
Carlson, D.M., and R.A. Daniels. 2004. Status of Fishes in New York: Increases, Declines, and Homogenization of Watersheds.
American Midland Naturalist 152: pp. 104-139.
Davidson-Arnott, R. 2005. Conceptual model of the effects of sea level rise on sandy coasts.
Journal of Coastal
Research 21 (6): pp. 1166-1172.
Diffenbaugh, N.S., M.A. Snyder, and L.C. Sloan. 2004. Could CO2- induced land cover feedbacks alter nearshore upwelling regimes . Proceeding of the Natural Academy of Science, 101 (1): pp. 27-32.
Dybas, C.L. 2006. On a Collision Course: Ocean Plankton and Climate Change . BioScience 56 (8): pp. 642-
646.
Galbraith, H., R. Jones, J. Clough, S. Herrod-Julius, B. Harrington, and G. Page. 2002. Global Climatic Change and Sea Level Rise: Potential Losses of Intertidal Habitat for Shorebirds . Waterbirds 25 (2): pp. 173-183.
Guo, Q., N. P. Psuty, G.P. Lordi, S. Glenn, and M.R. Mund.1995. Hydrographic Study of
Barnegat Bay, Year 1: Volume 1 and 2. Prepared by the Rutgers the State University of New Jersey, New
Brunswick, NJ, for the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Science and
Research.
Guo, Q. and Valle-Levinson. 2007. Tidal effects on estuarine circulation and outflow plume in the Chesapeake Bay. Continental Shelf Research 27: 20-42.

References (cont’d)
Gray, V.R., 1998. "The IPCC future projections: are they plausible" . Climate Research 10 pp. 155-162
Green, R., J.E. Maldonado, S. Droege, and M.V. McDonald. 2006. Tidal Marshes: A Global Perspective on the Evolution and Conservation of their Terrestrial Vertebrates . BioScience 56 (8): pp. 675 – 685.
Hartig, E.K., V. Gornitz, A. Kolker, F. Mushacke and D. Fallon. 2002. Athropogenic effects and climatechange impacts on salt marshes of Jamaica Bay, New York City.
Wetlands 22 (1): pp. 71 – 89.
Hull, C.H.J. and J.G.Titus (eds). 1997. Greenhouse Effect, Sea Level Rise, and Salinity in the Delaware
Estuary.
. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Delaware River Basin
Commission.
Jones, R. and E. Strange. 2006. A Pilot Study of the Ecological Consequences of Human Responses to Sea
Level Rise.
Stratus Consulting Inc., Boulder Colorado as part of a supporting document for the Barnegat
Bay National Estuary Program’s Conservation and Management Plan (item 4.1): pp. 1- 61.
Neira, F.J., I.C. Potter, and J.S. Bradley. 1992. Seasonal and spatial changes in the larval fish fauna within a large, temperate Autralian estuary. Marine Biology 112: 1- 16.
Ogdon, J., S.M. Davis, T.K. Barnes, K.J. Jacobs, and J.H. Gentile. 2005. Total System Conceptual
Ecological Model . Wetlands 25 (4): 955-979.
Reed, D.J., D.A. Bishara, D.R. Cahoon, J. Donnelly, M. Kearney, A.S. Kolker, L.L. Leonard, R.A. Orson, and
J.C. Stevenson. 2006. Site-specific scenarios for wetlands accretion as sea level rises in Mid-Atlantic
Region . Supporting document for CCSP 4.1 to Climatic Change Division U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency: pp. 1- 54.
Zedler, J.B. 2005. Restoring wetland plant diversity: a comparison of existing and adaptive approaches. Wetlands Ecology and Management 13: 5-14.