A cultural portrait of the Mid-Atlantic coastal ecosystem

This book has become the definitive field guide to the Chesapeake. Flora and fauna descriptions are arranged according to the bay's nine major habitats--from freshwater wetlands to saltwater marshes. The most important field marks of more than 500 species are shown in 350 superb pen-and-ink drawings, which make this benchmark work as beautiful as it is useful. The book is designed as a user-friendly introduction to the natural history of the Chesapeake Bay. Scientific jargon is kept to a minimum. Illustrations and text are paired to present an easy-to-use primer on the estuarine system. The book takes an ecological approach to life above and below the Chesapeake's surface. Wetland and aquatic communities are emphasized.

Estuaries are complex and fascinating natural environments, where constantly changing water depths generate rapidly reversing currents and transport vast quantities of salt, heat, and sediment on a daily basis. Estuaries: Monitoring and Modeling the Physical System examines these processes, offering extensive information about the geological evolution of estuaries, and details of bathymetry, tides, currents, salt and heat, and suspended sediment. By carefully building a working computer model which accurately emulates the complexities inherent in estuaries, students learn quickly to model the tides and currents, and then to build and test salinity, temperature, and suspended sediment modules. The book is supported by a supplimentary material at www.blackwellpublishing.com/hardisty which includes: * Excel routines for individual formulae and diagrams * Full coding for the estuarine model THE ANALYSIS OF TIDAL STREAM POWER – For Jack Hardisty’s other book and the accompanying website please click here: http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-047072451X.html

Life in the estuary is always changing. Ocean tides of salt water flow in and out of the estuary and mix with the fresh water that flows from rivers and streams. The animals that swim or wade in the waters or make the mudflats their homes must have physical or social adaptations that allow them to live in the salty mix. In this book, readers in grades 3-5 will discover how and why animals survive and thrive in these sheltered biomes. This NGSS-aligned series is packed with interesting facts and vivid photos that introduce readers to a variety of land and water animals. Each book includes a glossary, comprehension questions, and an activity for home or the classroom.

A coastal region's oldest inhabitants, particularly families of watermen and commercial fishers, often possess the deepest knowledge about a region and its ecological problems. Because of this, assaults on watermen lifeways and commercial fishing families--whether from organized recreational interests, real estate developers, or public policy makers--reduce the cultural and biological diversity of the coast and often upset the delicate environmental balance. Through the lens of the Mid-Atlantic Coast, especially the Chesapeake Bay and the Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds of North Carolina, David Griffith develops the theme that environmental degradation follows the loss of the most intimate understandings of coastal ecosystems. In The Estuary's Gift, Griffith traces the development of Mid-Atlantic cultures from the Algonquins and the earliest European families who hunted whales and netted herring, to present-day commercial fishing families who work the complex estuarine systems of the coast. In the process, he chronicles a series of developments that erode communities across American landscapes: the wearing away of local and regional history that results when national retail and restaurant chains convert local merchants into clerks and busboys, or the loss of biological diversity that follows the reconfiguration of countrysides to support monocrop agriculture, industrial chicken production, hog farming, forestry, and mining. Griffith insists that we heed the ways we treat one another in light of the ways we treat nature, measuring both by the standards we invoke when we give and receive gifts. Stories of conflict among fishers, of Mexican immigrant women brought to seafood houses to pick the meat from cooked, cooled crab--displacing and replacing African-American women--and of the slow yet steady attempts to criminalize family fishing practices that reach back thirteen generations show the ways in which the rights, obligations, and responsibilities of gift exchange have eroded. Only when we consider human relations as an integral part of the natural cycles will we begin to restore the balance. More than an account of the decline of fishing families or stressed natural resources, The Estuary's Gift illustrates how pressing social problems, such as environmental degradation and assaults on working families, play out in local contexts and local history.

Acknowledging the present inability to determine objectively the status and trends among estuarine ecosystems, the environmental research community has recently stepped up efforts to develop and evaluate meaningful estuarine indicators. This goal requires the effort of researchers from a broad spectrum of disciplines. In order to expedite this initiative, many of the world's leading estuarine scientists came together to present their views at the 2003 Estuarine Indicators Workshop. Derived from this conference of leading estuarine scientists, Estuarine Indicators presents the principles, concepts, practical use, and application of indicators in estuarine research and management practices. Topics include: the theory behind environmental indicators and their presumed attributes; the methods and protocols of indicator development and evaluation; a presentation of effective and ineffective indicator examples; and discussions of the future directions in research and management practices. This is an ideal reference for researchers, scientists, and students from any field dealing with estuaries and estuarine ecosystems. Its introductory-level chapters are accessible to novices and seasoned experts alike, and the applications and interpretation of research data suit the needs of environmental managers. This is a truly multidisciplinary, comprehensive compendium upon which future research will undoubtedly be built.

In the heart of the book, they describe the natural history of the eggs, larvae, and juveniles of seventy fish species, the most abundant and ecologically/economically important of 300+ species whose young are found in the Hudson and Delaware estuaries and smaller New Jersey rivers, estuaries, and bays. They stress the temporal and spatial distribution of eggs, larvae, and juveniles. They also analyze the patterns and subtle variations in the ecology and life history strategies of these species: their growth rates, where they find refuge from predators, how they survive their first winter, and how they share the estuarine habitat with so many other species.