Tidal Marsh Restoration at Poplar Island: II. Elevation Trends, Vegetation Development, and Carbon Dynamics

Staver, Lorie W.; Stevenson, J. Court; Cornwell, Jeffrey C.; Nidzieko, Nicholas J.; Staver, K. W.; Owens, Michael S.; Logan, Lauren H.; Kim, C.; Malkin, Sairah Y.

doi:10.1007/s13157-020-01295-4

Cited by 23 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 62 publications

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“…Recently, monitoring of restored tidal marshes has been a focal point for many restoration projects around the US [3,24]. The combination of UAVs to acquire very high resolution aerial imagery of restoration sites combined with more traditional Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) geodetic receivers in Real Time Kinematic (RTK) mode to survey the position of vegetative species allows improved accuracy for mapping the marsh vegetation community [25,26].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Seasonality and Characterization Mapping of Restored Tidal Marsh by NDVI Imageries Coupling UAVs and Multispectral Camera

et al. 2021

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Salt marsh evolution is strongly affected by tidal processes and ecology, which regulate sediment accretion and erosional rates. A balance between marsh erosion and deposition in a restored tidal wetland is crucial for analyzing restoration strategies to adopt in a natural context. Here, we present an integrated approach monitoring salt marsh seasonal changes over several months in a microtidal restored salt marsh of the Paul S. Sarbanes Ecosystem Restoration Project at Poplar Island (MD, USA). The project is undertaken at a restoration site where sediment dredged from the shipping channels in the upper Chesapeake Bay is being used to restore a tidal marsh habitat in mid-Chesapeake Bay. We flew an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with an RGB and a multispectral camera to obtain a high-resolution map of the planimetric position of vegetation and to monitor the health of the marsh vegetation in diverse seasons. Due to its extension of 400 m by 400 m, a total of four flight plans were necessary to cover the entire marsh flying at a 40 m altitude obtaining a 2 cm Ground Sample Distance (GSD). This technique provides reliable results at a very low cost, enabling an accurate assessment of the marsh platforms to be conducted over time, due to both the very high spatial resolution and the precise georeferencing of the images for the comparisons. Our results show seasonal variability in the two dominant species colonizing the low marsh, Spartina alterniflora, and high marsh, Sporobolus pumilus. While the lower marshes showed a higher variability along seasons, the up-land vegetation showed persistent green foliage during cold seasons. Detecting salt marsh evolution and seasonality coupled with field measurements can help to improve the accuracy of hydrodynamic and sediment transport models. Understanding the drivers of salt marsh evolution is vital for informing restoration practices and designs, in order to improve coastal resilience, and develop and coastal management strategies.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Seasonality and Characterization Mapping of Restored Tidal Marsh by NDVI Imageries Coupling UAVs and Multispectral Camera

et al. 2021

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“…Tidal exchange of N and other dissolved and particulate constituents on an annual basis was estimated from a tidal flux study [17]. In brief, water velocity measurements were made over a period of one to four weeks each season using a Nortek Aquadopp acoustic Doppler profiler (ADP) mounted on a weighted PVC plate and placed in the center of one of the concrete box culverts, equidistant from the open ends and sidewalls.…”

Section: Tidal Exchangementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Separate subsamples filtered through Whatman 2.5 cm GFF filters were analyzed colorimetrically for particulate N (PN) on an Exeter Analytical CE-440 Elemental Analyzer, and chlorophyll a fluorometrically following acetone extraction [28]. Volume-weighted concentrations were multiplied by the average tidal prism for each 24 h monitoring period (Table A1) to obtain the flux (q) for each flood or ebb period [17]. The difference between flood and ebb provides the net tidal flux that is relevant for the mass balance, and a total marsh area of 11.22 ha was used to normalize fluxes.…”

Section: Tidal Exchangementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The study was conducted in a constructed tidal marsh at the Paul S. Sarbanes Ecosystem Restoration Project at Poplar Island (Poplar Island) in mid-Chesapeake Bay, where the restoration of over 300 hectares (ha) of tidal marsh is underway using nutrient rich, fine-grained dredged sediment from the navigation channels approaching Baltimore Harbor, MD [16]. Previous work has shown that the abundant nutrients support rapid development of marsh vegetation and organic matter accumulation, and robust rates of vertical accretion [17]. As part of the ongoing assessment of the suitability of this material for tidal marsh restoration, we examined the wetland N balance through estimation of the soil N reservoir, standing stocks, and key N fluxes.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Fate of Nitrogen in Dredged Material Used for Tidal Marsh Restoration

Staver

Cornwell

Nidzieko

et al. 2021

JMSE

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Tidal marsh restoration using dredged material is being undertaken in many coastal areas to replace lost habitat and ecosystem services due to tidal marsh loss. The fate of high levels of nitrogen (N) in fine-grained dredged material used as a substrate for marsh restoration is uncertain, but if exported tidally may cause subtidal habitat degradation. In this study, a mass balance was developed to characterize N fluxes in a two-year-old restored tidal marsh constructed with fine-grained dredged material at Poplar Island, MD, in Chesapeake Bay, and to evaluate the potential impact on the adjacent submersed aquatic vegetation (SAV) habitat. Denitrification and N accumulation in Spartina organic matter were identified as the major sinks (21.31 and 28.5 mg N m−2 d−1, respectively), while tidal export of TN was more modest (9.4 mg N m−2 d−1) and inorganic N export was low (1.59 mg N m−2 d−1). Internal cycling helped retain N within the marsh. Mineralization of N associated with labile organic matter in the dredged material was likely a large, but unquantified, source of N supporting robust plant growth and N exports. Exceedances of SAV water quality habitat requirements in the subtidal region adjacent to the marsh were driven by elevated Chesapeake Bay concentrations rather than enrichment by the marsh.

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“…As breaches become the inlets of the restored marshes, they have an important control on water and sediment volumes entering and leaving the system during each tidal cycle, and hence on sediment accretion rates (Oosterlee et al, 2020). Other important design measures may involve excavating an initial channel network and treating soil conditions to facilitate soil drainage (O'Brien and Zedler, 2006), planting manually vegetation tussocks to ensure vegetation encroachment (Staver et al, 2020) or building hydraulic structures to control the tidal range and create optimal ecological conditions for vegetation development (Maris et al, 2007;Oosterlee et al, 2018). These design choices are mainly driven by restoration objectives and local environmental conditions.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Biogeomorphic modeling to assess resilience of tidal marsh restoration to sea level rise and sediment supply

Gourgue

Belzen

Schwarz

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Abstract. There is an increasing demand for creation and restoration of tidal marshes around the world, as they provide highly valued ecosystem services. Yet, tidal marshes are strongly vulnerable to factors such as sea level rise and declining sediment supply. How fast the restored ecosystem develops, how resilient it is to sea level rise, and how this can be steered by restoration design, are key questions that are typically challenging to assess. In this paper, we apply a biogeomorphic model to a planned tidal marsh restoration by dike breaching. Our modeling approach integrates tidal hydrodynamics, sediment transport and vegetation dynamics, accounting for relevant fine-scale flow-vegetation interactions (less than 1 m2) and their impact on vegetation and landform development at the landscape scale (several km2) and on the long term (several decades). Our model performance is positively evaluated against observations of vegetation and geomorphic development in adjacent tidal marshes. Model scenarios demonstrate that the restored tidal marsh can keep pace with realistic rates of sea level rise and that its resilience is more sensitive to the availability of suspended sediments than to the rate of sea level rise. We further demonstrate that restoration design options can steer marsh resilience, as it affects the rates and spatial patterns of biogeomorphic development. By varying the width of two dike breaches, which serve as tidal inlets to the restored marsh, we show that a larger difference in the width of the two inlets leads to more diversity in restored habitats. This study showcases that biogeomorphic modeling can support management choices in restoration design to optimize tidal marsh development towards sustainable restoration goals.

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Tidal Marsh Restoration at Poplar Island: II. Elevation Trends, Vegetation Development, and Carbon Dynamics

Cited by 23 publications

References 62 publications

Seasonality and Characterization Mapping of Restored Tidal Marsh by NDVI Imageries Coupling UAVs and Multispectral Camera

Seasonality and Characterization Mapping of Restored Tidal Marsh by NDVI Imageries Coupling UAVs and Multispectral Camera

The Fate of Nitrogen in Dredged Material Used for Tidal Marsh Restoration

Biogeomorphic modeling to assess resilience of tidal marsh restoration to sea level rise and sediment supply

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