Its wide, flaring base gives it a low center of gravity and, with its widespread root system, helps stabilize it in its shifting, watery substrate. They look like supporting buttresses and are thought to be a means whereby additional oxygen is supplied to the submerged roots. J.R.E. Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. A detailed study of this most fertile of all biomes. Explains important interrela- tionships of the aquatic food chain with special emphasis on the role of Spartina grasses, surveys the plant and animal resources of the salt marsh and the importance of these areas to continuing bountiful life in the sea.
Coverage includes tidal cycles, Spartina, glasswort, and insects.
20 slides and detailed guide. If one could draw a line to separate salt marsh areas from normal dry-land areas, the line would follow the tideline, the edge of the incoming ocean tides and waves. It would follow the banks of the many tidal streams which flow into the ocean, and would trace the edges of coastal areas which have no rivers or creeks. The extent to which a marsh thrusts inland depends on the surrounding terrain, and therefore changes as that terrain changes. Nature, man, or both acting together, can cause these changes.