Controls on Sediment Delivery to New England Salt Marshes and Resulting Limits on Future Resilience

Inorganic sediment supply is a critical component of a salt marsh’s ability to vertically aggrade in response to relative sea level rise, yet there remains significant uncertainty on the primary sources, timing, and rates of sediment delivery to marshes. This is particularly true for the Northeastern, U.S. Atlantic coastline where the magnitude and sourcing of sediment varies widely due to post-glaciated landscapes. Here we present results from a 3-year study between 2020 and 2023 designed to inform management and restoration decisions related to northeast marshes through the development of a scalable method for assessing the availability and distribution of inorganic sediment to and within marshes, including the identification of thresholds of inorganic sediment delivery required to maintain a stable marsh platform under various rates of sea level rise for the region. Field investigations involved instrumental observations, deployment and recovery of seasonal sediment traps, and the collection and analysis of marsh core samples. The study targets 12 marsh systems spanning environmental gradients for the region that allowed us to examine different sources and delivery mechanisms of sediment. Our compilation of existing data reveals spatial variability in marsh accretion rates, but also highlights regional trends and the general agreement among rates determined through a variety of different methodologies and time spans. Our instrumental observations and sediment trap deployments confirm differences in sediment delivery among marshes. Back barrier marshes with relatively small watersheds predominantly accumulated inorganic sediment during the fall in response to large storms and wave activity suspending coastal and offshore sediment deposits (marine sources) that are carried into marshes through tidal advection. In contrast, marshes proximal to large rivers (>10,000 km² watersheds) have higher accumulation rates and receive the bulk of their inorganic sediment in response to fluvial delivery of terrestrial sediment during spring freshet events. Among our 12 study marshes, only one experienced its highest rate of sediment accumulation during summer months, which we attribute to substantially greater crab herbivory promoting internal recycling of sediment. Overall, we have measured sediment accumulation in over 450 individual traps across spring, summer and fall seasons in twelve marshes. The results from the analysis of these samples represents the largest dataset of its kind for the region and enable defining regionally appropriate input variables for modeling the spatial variations of sedimentation across marsh surfaces as a function of tidal inundation and distance to the nearest channel, as well as providing defined sedimentation limits needed to sustain healthy marsh growth under future sea level rise and various potential restoration pathways.