Sea Level Rise Modifies Biogeochemical Cycles in Winyah Bay, South Carolina Wetlands
Abstract
Rising sea level along the relatively flat southeastern US coastal plain significantly changes both vegetation composition and salinity of coastal wetlands, eventually modifying ecosystem functions and biogeochemical processes of these wetlands. We conducted a two-year study to evaluate the dynamics and relationships among aboveground productivity, greenhouse and halocarbon gas emissions, nutrients, and dissolved organic matter of a freshwater forested wetland, a salt-impacted and degraded forested wetland, and a salt marsh in Winyah Bay, South Carolina, representing the salinity gradient and the transition from freshwater forested wetland to salt marsh due to sea level rise. The degraded forested wetland had significantly lower above-ground productivity with annual stem growth of 102 g/m^2/yr and litterfall of 392 g/m^2/yr compared to the freshwater forested wetland (230 and 612 g/m^2/yr, respectively). High methane emission [> 50 mmol/m2/day, n = 4] was only observed in the freshwater-forested wetland but there was a strong smell of sulfide noticed in the salt marsh, suggesting that different redox processes control the decomposition of natural organic matter along the salinity gradient. In addition, the largest CHCl3 [209 × 183 nmol/m2/day, n = 4] emission was observed in the degraded forested wetland, but net CH3Cl [257 × 190 nmol/m2/day, n = 4] and CH3Br [28 × 20 nmol/m2/day, n = 4] emissions were only observed in the salt marsh, suggesting different mechanisms in response to salt intrusion at that sites. The highest DOC concentration (28 - 42 mg/L) in monthly water samples was found in degraded forest wetland, followed by the freshwater forested wetland (19 - 38 mg/L) and salt marsh (9 - 18 mg/L). Results demonstrate that the salt-impacted degraded wetland has unique biogeochemical cycles that differ from unaltered freshwater forested wetland and salt marsh.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2013
- Bibcode:
- 2013AGUFM.B32A..04C
- Keywords:
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- 0497 BIOGEOSCIENCES Wetlands;
- 1641 GLOBAL CHANGE Sea level change;
- 0439 BIOGEOSCIENCES Ecosystems;
- structure and dynamics;
- 0428 BIOGEOSCIENCES Carbon cycling