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Foreseeable Flooding and Death of Coastal Wetland Forests

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2009

S.R. Pezeshki
Affiliation:
Respectively Assistant Professor, Boyd Professor, and Plant Physiologist, Laboratory for Wetland Soils & Sediments, Center for Wetland Resources, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70803, USA.

Extract

Relationships between sedimentation, submergence, and deterioration, of a Mississippi River deltaic-plain coastal wetland forest were investigated. Measured sedimentation rates (0.63 ± 0.35 cm per yr) as determined by 137Cs-dating were considerably less than the rapid increase in water-level (c. 1.36 cm per yr). Transplanted seedlings of Quercus lyrata (Overcup Oak) and of Taxodium distichum (Bald Cypress) survived only on the most elevated natural ridge in this swamp-forest.

Type
Main Papers
Copyright
Copyright © Foundation for Environmental Conservation 1987

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