PRESENTERS

• Mihaela Enache, New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection
• Tom Kutcher, Rhode Island Natural History Survey

ABSTRACTS

Mihaela Enache
Diatom-based applications for assessment and monitoring of New Jersey coastal wetlands condition

Due to high sensitivity to environmental conditions, diatoms are one of the most used aquatic indicators in environmental assessment, mitigation, and monitoring. NJDEP started investigations based on coastal diatoms in collaboration with external partners in 2012 . These investigations revealed an inventory of more than 800 species, with about one third being new to science. Numerical analyses revealed strong relationships between diatoms and salinity, nutrients, and tidal exposure. Weighted-averaging partial least square transfer functions were developed for Tidal Exposure Index (TEI; R2boot = 0.87; RMSEPboot = 15.6%) and Standardized Water-Level Index (SWLI; R2boot = 0.56; RMSEPboot = 0.18) to assess the sea level rise (SLR) impacts, in addition to sediment total nitrogen concentration (TN; R2boot = 0.58; RMSEPboot = 0.29% dry weight). Investigations were conducted based on sediment diatoms on a high number of NJ wetland sites to reveal regional trends in tidal flooding and nutrient pollution. Overall, sites with highest nitrogen pollution and sites that are receiving highest impacts from tidal exposure did not reveal a specific regional trend but were scattered across the NJ coast suggesting that conditions can vary locally. Results from these investigations are providing wetland stakeholders with an additional tool to establish restoration goals and ensure best management practices to address nutrient pollution, climate change, and SLR.

Tom Kutcher
Rhode Island’s Salt Marsh Restoration, Assessment, and Monitoring Program (RAMP)

Rhode Island salt marshes are in critical danger of degradation and loss from pervasive anthropogenic disturbances, including inundation stress associated with sea-level rise. In recent decades, salt marsh platform elevations have lagged behind the rising tide frame concurrent with a loss of nearly 12% of vegetated area from edge and platform dieoff. Managers and scientists have responded by developing and implementing plans to organize salt-marsh monitoring, assessment, and intervention efforts while leveraging collective knowledge across state, federal, academic, and NGO agencies. The multi-agency collaboration we call the Salt Marsh RAMP (Restoration, Assessment, and Monitoring Program) has made steady progress in actuating these plans by standardizing management tools and methods across agencies, collecting condition and disturbance data across numerous marshes, expanding long-term monitoring sites and methods, prioritizing marshes for restoration and migration facilitation, testing and implementing innovative restoration and conservation methods, documenting and assessing restoration outcomes, applying adaptive management, and increasing the state’s capacity to initiate and carry out restoration and conservation actions. This presentation will outline our past, current, and upcoming work.

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