| SLEP |
ST. LUCIE ESTUARY PRIMARY PRODUCTIVITY STUDY |
Peter Doering |
CES |
|
15-NOV-1999 |
12-MAR-2001 |
The South Florida Water Management District performed the St. Lucie Estuary Productivity Study (SLEP) in 2000-2001 to improve the understanding of the SLE, and to support the establishment of pollutant load reduction goals and total maximum daily loads. The St. Lucie Productivity Study included the collection of water quality data focused on nutrient cycling processes and phytoplankton primary productivity in the SLE during 2000 and 2001. Primary productivity was measured at 4 sites (two stations per site) representing four different regions of the estuary over a period of 15 months, and benthic fluxes of nutrients measured at the four stations over 12 months. A suite of water quality constituents?including nutrients and field parameters?were measured at various depths at all eight stations. Zooplankton were also sampled.
All project contacts (co-workers, contractors, interns, labs, etc.):
o Nutrient and other water quality samples analyzed by District Lab
o Benthic Flux Measurements Conducted by Dennis Hanisak, Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute (Contract C6627)
o Data Analyzed by Malcolm Pirnie: Two Reports produced. One focused on primary productivity the other on a nutrient budget
Other Related Project Information:
o The four sites were sampled monthly.
o Two of the four (Blue Marlin and HR1) were sampled intensively, on a weekly basis from 8/21/00 to 10/09/00 and 01/22/02 ? 03/05/01
o Also note that the benthic flux data produced in this study ranked amongst the highest ever reported. For this reason we felt the data were suspect. Dissolved oxygen data was collected during the benthic chamber incubations and a simple calculation of the DO consumption/Nutrient regeneration rates would have allowed us to verify the reliability of the data. Unfortunately, we had not written into the contract that the contractor provide us with the DO data. We assumed that he would. We were wrong, so consider the benthic flux data from this project to be spurious. |
