HYDROGRAPHIC AND BIOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS IN A SALT MARSH IN THE HUDSON RIVER ESTUARY

Physical, hydrographic, floral and faunal data have been collected over a 5-year period in the Piermont Marsh, 40 km north of New York City. Piermont is a brackish tidal marsh on the western bank of the Hudson River that is part of the National Estuarine Research Reserve System. Currently, the Marsh is dominated by an invasive plant species, Phragmites australis. Isolated patches of Spartina patens survive in the marsh interior, as well as small populations of other native grasses. P. australis may raise the marsh surface by trapping sediment and building up a thick mat of accumulated dead culms, thereby reducing aquatic habitat and changing the hydrologic regime. The Marsh is known to play an important role in nekton recruitment, offering rich feeding and shelter from predation. However, few studies have documented the distribution of species utilizing the Marsh and their variability over time. Between July 2006 and August, 2010, the Marsh has been the focus of a long-term monitoring project by the Secondary School Field Research Program. Students and teachers from The Young Women’s Leadership School of East Harlem, and several other public NYC high schools, have conducted summer field campaigns and continuous, year-round monitoring in the Marsh. In this contribution, we present: a 4-year time series of biologic sampling; continuous records of depth, salinity, temperature and dissolved oxygen in the Marsh interior ponds; hydrographic data at all nekton sampling points; a succession study of Phragmites australis expansion; and nutrient data from the principal Marsh outflows. All data were collected, measured and analyzed by students and their teachers, working with research scientists from Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and Loyola University, New Orleans. Plans are in progress for building a platform from which sediment accretion on the Marsh surface will be monitored monthly.

Additional co-authors: Mariama Diaw, Rossibel Fernandez, Maritza Ortega, Alejandra Perez, Destiny Torres