RESPONSES OF COASTAL WETLANDS TO RISING SEA LEVEL

Salt marsh ecosystems are maintained by the dominant macrophytes that regulate the elevation of their habitat within a narrow portion of the intertidal zone by accumulating organic matter and trapping inorganic sediment. The long-term stability of these ecosystems is explained by interactions among sea level, land elevation, primary production, and sediment accretion that regulate the elevation of the sediment surface toward an equilibrium with mean sea level. We show here in a salt marsh that this equilibrium is adjusted upward by increased production of the salt marsh macrophyte Spartina alterniflora and downward by an increasing rate of relative sea-level rise (RSLR). Adjustments in marsh surface elevation…

• NS
  National Science Foundation
• UG
  U.S. Geological Survey