Tidal flows in salt marsh creeks

Fluxes of water, sediments, and biogeochemical compounds in salt marshes

“…This model implies that when there is a sharp increase in flooded area A, the discharge surges because more water is needed to flood a larger surface (or more water must be removed to drain it; see Figure 1B result, two distinct surges are occurring in the channels, one when the marsh platform is first flooded and one when the marsh platform is drained. These surges have been measured in salt marsh channels by several authors (Myrick and Leopold 1963;Bayliss-Smith et al 1978;Healey et al 1981;French and Stoddart 1992). However, the static model implies that the water is instantaneously delivered to the entire marsh, when in reality it takes a finite time to reach each marsh location, depending on the travel path both within the channels and on the marsh platform.…”

Velocity and sediment surge: What do we see at times of very shallow water on intertidal mudflats?

“…Early field studies of velocity surges were mainly carried out on salt marsh creeks during spring tides or storm surges (Bayliss-Smith et al, 1979;French and Stoddart, 1992). Later on, observations in fair weather indicated that well-defined velocity surges also occur during almost every tidal cycle in lower tidal channels Nowacki and Ogston, 2013).…”

“…Periodic emergence and submergence of tidal flats result in frequent variations in water depth, leading to a frequent occurrence of very shallow water conditions both temporally and spatially. This gives rise to a special hydrodynamic phenomenon as "velocity surge", which has been investigated and discussed by many researchers (e.g., Bayliss-Smith et al, 1979;Wang et al, 1999;Nowacki and Ogston, 2013). …”

“…Velocity surges (or pulses), defined as short-lived occurrences of elevated velocity (Nowacki and Ogston, 2013), usually associated with elevated suspended sediment concentration have been reported for both muddy and sandy tidal flats (Bayliss-Smith et al, 1979;Zhang, 1987). Early field studies of velocity surges were mainly carried out on salt marsh creeks during spring tides or storm surges (Bayliss-Smith et al, 1979;French and Stoddart, 1992).…”

Currents in a small channel on a sandy tidal flat

“…Previous observations of tidal channels have focused on flows in marshes (Bayliss-Smith et al, 1979, Healey et al 1981, Leopold et al 1993Fagherazzi et al, 2008), geomorphology (Bridges and Leeder 1976, Fagherazzi and Furbis 2001, Fagherazzi and Sun 2004, and many others), internal waves , tidal constituents (Blanton et al 2002), stratification Stacey 2005a,b, 2006), and turbulence Stacey 2005a,b, 2006). Numerical models suggest that flows in larger channels are stronger than the flows across the flats (Fagherazzi et al 2003, D'Alpaos et al 2006, resulting in complicated 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 3 patterns of circulation and channel-flat exchanges.…”