National Estuarine Research Reserve System-Wide Monitoring Program (SWMP) Alicia Helms & Craig Cornu South Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve

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1 National Estuarine Research Reserve System-Wide Monitoring Program (SWMP) Alicia Helms & Craig Cornu South Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve

2 Outline Overview of National Estuarine Research Reserve System (NERRS) Background of the System-Wide Monitoring Program (SWMP) Abiotic Water Quality & Weather Indicators Biological Monitoring Watershed Habitat and Land Use Mapping South Slough Reserve-Monitoring locations Centralized Data Management Office SWMP Syntheses, Data Products and Applications SeagrassNet Monitoring

3 Mission: to promote stewardship of the nation s estuaries through science and education using a system of protected areas Programs: Research, Monitoring, Education, Coastal Training, Resource Stewardship

4 South Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve North Bend Charleston Coos Bay Designated in 1974 as first NERR Established as part of CZMA NOAA and coastal states (Oregon Department of State Lands) Habitats include mixture of open water channels, tidal and freshwater wetlands, riparian areas, and forested uplands South Slough NERR (4800 ac) South Slough Watershed 21 mi 2

5 System-Wide Monitoring Program Initiated in 1995 Developed in consideration/cooperation with: NOAA National Status and Trends Monitoring Program (1984) US EPA-Environmental Monitoring & Assessment Program (1984) National Park Service Inventory and Monitoring Program National Science Foundation-Long Term Ecological Research Network (1980) Identify and track short-term variability and long-term changes in the integrity (including biodiversity) of representative estuarine ecosystems and coastal watersheds, for the purpose of contributing to effective national, regional and site-specific coastal zone management ie land use and population growth, habitat loss, water quality degradation, and changes in biological communities.

6 System-Wide Monitoring Program Established as a phased monitoring program to focus on three aspects of Coastal Ecosystem Characteristics Phase I: Abiotic Water Quality & Weather Indicators Phase II: Biological Monitoring Phase III: Watershed Habitat and Land Use Mapping

7 SWMP Water Quality Stations 4 Water Quality Stations YSI 6600 EDS Datasonde Continuous near real-time (15 min.) measurements of water parameters: Temperature Salinity/Conductivity Dissolved Oxygen ph Turbidity Chlorophyll/fluorescence Water level Temp(C) Salinity(ppt) DO Conc(mg/L Depth(m) Turb(NTU) Chloro(ug/L) Charleston Bridge :00 15:30 21:00 02:30 08:00 13: :00 15:30 21:00 02:30 08:00 13: :00 15:30 21:00 02:30 08:00 13: :00 15:30 21:00 02:30 08:00 13: :00 15:30 21:00 02:30 08:00 13: :00 15:30 21:00 02:30 08:00 13:30 07/18/07 07/25/07 08/01/07 08/09/07 08/16/07 08/23/07 DateTime(M/D/Y)

8 SWMP Weather Station Parameters (5 sec): air temp 12 V-DC relative humidity 40 W solar wind speed wind direction barometric pressure precipitation photosynthetically active radiation

9 SWMP Nutrient Monitoring 4 Nutrient Stations ISCO Nutrients-High Tide & Low Tide Grab samples & Diel Sampling (25 hr.) Monthly measurements of dissolved inorganic nutrients & plant pigments Nitrogen: NO 2, NO 3, NH 4, DIN Phosphorus: PO 4 (orthophosphate) Plant Pigments: Chl a, phaeophytin Bacteria (total coliforms, E. coli)

10 Euhaline Boathouse Location of SWMP Monitoring Stations Polyhaline Charleston Poly/Mesohaline Valino Island Euhaline = >30 ppt Polyhaline = ppt Mesohaline = 5 18 ppt Oligohaline = ppt Oligohaline Winchester Oligohaline Sengstacken Water Quality Nutrients Both Weather

11 NOAA Climate Reference Network The USCRN's primary goal is to provide future long-term homogeneous temperature and precipitation observations that can be coupled to long-term historical observations for the detection and attribution of present and future climate change. 114 stations in the contiguous United States, 6 stations in Alaska, and 2 stations in Hawaii. OR Coos Bay 8 SW, South Slough Frederickson Marsh Site 43.3 N W August 8, 2008 Core measurements Air temperature Precipitation Solar Radiation Wind Speed Relative Humidity Ground SurfaceTemperature

12 SWMP Data Management: Centralized Data Management Office SWMP Data for each reserve are managed by the CDMO located at the North Inlet-Winyah Bay Reserve in Georgetown, SC Provides QA/QC for the reserve system, Maintains and updates the Reserve System's standard operating procedures to ensure SWMP data are collected in the same way at each reserve Launched new Data export System March 2010 Advancement of data and information management program. Continuation and advancement of the on-line data and information server accessible across a variety of computer platforms regardless of sites' level of technological sophistication. Technical support services individual and group training. [ CDMO Data Management Committee and annual workshop avenue for the exchange of ideas and information related to database management, technological advances and other data collection and monitoring program. CDMO annualtraining Workshop series to provide training for NERRS research technicians working on SWMP initiatives.

13 SWMP Phase II: Biological Monitoring 2004: Successful Pilot projects funded at 11 reserves to characterize biotic diversity in NERRS Estuarine ecosystems by assessing community composition and species distribution and abundance in Emergent Marsh and Submerged Aquatic Vegetation habitats 2005/2006: Additional 7 pilot projects completed 2010: NOAA funding available for 1/2 reserves to begin implementing biological monitoring to characterize and monitor ecological characteristics of vegetative communities Emergent Marsh and SAV Monitoring Marsh & Eelgrass Transects

14 Phase III: Watershed Habitat and Land Use Monitoring Focuses on tracking and evaluating changes over time in coastal and estuarine habitats. The goal is to understand the relationships between land use and habitat changes, anthropogenic influences from the watershed, and environmental stressors related to climate change. Involves developing a land use/land cover classification and mapping protocols, implementation protocols, and documentation of the classification scheme

15 Application of Real-Time Water Quality Data to Shellfish Growers A partnership between the Northwest Association of Networked Ocean Observing Systems (NANOOS) and NERRS has created a new system to allow commercial shellfish growers in the Pacific Northwest to gain access to real-time water quality data. Mariculture operators use the data to monitor water quality growing conditions which influence the health of their oysters. The water measurements and reference information are available through a user-friendly web interface which includes an alert system that can be customized to the shellfish growers needs (

16 National SWMP Data Syntheses NERRS 10 Anniversary Report on SWMP Data Applications ( ) Synthesis of the Water Quality Data from 1995 to 2000 Synthesis of the Water Quality Data from 1996 to 1998 Synthesis of Data from the NERRS SWMP for the Mid-Atlantic Region (2007) Goals Characterize water quality conditions at sites individually, regionally, and nationally Compare key indicators of water quality stress, with an emphasis on hypoxia Overview of storm events Classify sample sites and reserves into groups based on similarity/dissimilarity in key water quality indicators and site characteristics

17 SeagrassNet Monitoring The SeagrassNet Program coordinates the efforts of scientists and managers around the world to document the status and trends of global seagrass resources. The program started in 2001 in the Western Pacific and now includes 28 sites in 15 countries (Short et al. 2004). The program has a standard monitoring protocol manual (available online at and a webbased data reporting system. South Slough will assess the strengths and weaknesses of both the NERR/SWMP and SeagrassNet monitoring protocols as applied to estuaries in the Pacific Northwest, and make recommendations on the best way to integrate these biomonitoring efforts as a potential long-term component of the NERR SWMP effort.

18 Conclusions Provides an ecosystem-based network for understanding the temporal and spatial variability of ecosystem components and their interactions Provides a long-term database for the estuarine reserves protected area network Establishes a baseline for measuring changes in environmental conditions and ecological processes Provides a research framework for evaluating ecosystem conditions and interpreting and predicting responses to change Challenges Need for long-term financial support to conduct syntheses, define variability/trends Communication/coordination among groups conducting monitoring Designing programs that track natural variability and separate human impacts Integration of SWMP data into decision/planning by coastal zone managers

19 Acknowledgements South Slough staff OIMB/UO UW CICEET NANOOS CDMO