1 1 2 In The Matter of: 3 4 SAVANNAH HARBOR IMPROVEMENT PROJECT 5 STAKEHOLDERS' EVALUATION GROUP MEETING 6 (SEG) 7 JULY 10, 2001 8 9 10 MIGHTY 8TH AIR FORCE HERITAGE MUSEUM 11 SAVANNAH, GEORGIA 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 2 1 2 I N D E X PAGE 3 OPENING REMARKS AND INTRODUCTIONS ------- 3 4 APPROVE AGENDA FOR JULY 2001 MEETING ---- 9 5 APPROVE MAY 2001 TRANSCRIPT ------------- 9 6 OLD BUSINESS Tidal Wetland Studies ----------------- 13 7 (Wiley Kitchens and Jon Bossart) 8 Striped Bass Study report ----------- 88 (Ted Will) 9 COMMITTEE REPORTS 10 Aquifer Impacts ----------------------- 150 Beach Erosion ------------------------- 150 11 Dredging and Disposal ----------------- 151 Fisheries & Aquatic Resources --------- 151 12 Modeling Technical Review Group-------- 151 Striped Bass -------------------------- 159 13 Communications ------------------------ 159 Economics Working Group --------------- 159 14 Operating Guidelines ------------------ 162 15 NEXT MEETING DATE ----------------------- 163 16 CERTIFICATE ---------------------------- 166 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3 1 2 PROCEEDINGS 3 MR. DYSART: It's 9:05. We'll 4 call the meeting of the Stakeholders 5 Evaluation Group to order. 6 We have, as usual, a full table. 7 We have a full agenda today, which 8 reminds me that we'll pass out the draft 9 agenda. 10 And I would invite -- Carl, why 11 don't you start out introducing yourself 12 and indicate who you are representing and 13 move around this way. 14 MR. HALL: Carl Hall, Georgia 15 Department of Natural Resources, Wildlife 16 Resources Division. 17 MR. WILL: Ted Will, Georgia 18 Department of Natural Resources, Wildlife 19 Resources Division. 20 MR. STEVENS: Stuart Stevens, 21 Georgia DNR, Coastal Management Program. 22 MR. MONTAGUE: I'm Clay Montague 23 for the University of Florida. 24 MS. LEFFEK: Teri Leffek with 25 Fife and Clydesdale Plantations. 4 1 2 MS. JENNINGS: Judy Jennings, 3 Georgia Sierra. 4 MR. SHELBY: John Shelby with 5 League of Women Voters. 6 MR. HIETT: Joe Hiett with 7 Connect Savannah. 8 MR. BAILEY: Bill Bailey, Corps 9 of Engineers. 10 MR. DYSART: Ben Dysart, SEG 11 facilitator. 12 MR. BERSON: Will Berson. I'm 13 with the Georgia Conservancy. 14 MR. MOORE: Charlie Moore, South 15 Carolina DNR. 16 MS. WENDT: Priscilla Wendt, 17 South Carolina DNR. 18 MS. VAUGHN: Kathy Vaughn, 19 Georgia Ports. 20 MS. REES: Ally Rees, Rees 21 Engineering. 22 MR. REES: Morgan Rees, 23 Consultant for GPA. 24 MR. SCHALLER: David Schaller, 25 Georgia Ports Authority. 5 1 2 MR. KEEGAN: Larry Keegan, 3 consultant with GPA. 4 MR. ELLIS: Bo Ellis with Applied 5 Technology & Management. 6 MR. BRUSH: Janell Brush with 7 University of Florida. 8 MR. DUBERSTEIN: Jamie 9 Duberstein, University of Florida. 10 MR. JUE: Harry Jue, City of 11 Savannah, Water & Sewer. 12 MS. MOORER: Hope Moorer, Georgia 13 Ports Authority. 14 MR. PHILLIPS: John Phillips, 15 Georgia Department of Transportation. 16 MR. SUTLIVE: Charlie Sutlive, 17 Savannah Maritime Association. 18 MR. BROWN: Tommy Brown, Savannah 19 Pilots. 20 MR. PLACHY: Doug Plachy, U.S. 21 Army Corps of Engineers, Savannah. 22 MR. FLOCK: Allan Flock, U.S. 23 Fish & Wildlife Service, Savannah Coastal 24 Refuge. 25 MR. GRABILL: Bill Grabill, Fish 6 1 2 & Wildlife Service, Atlanta. 3 MR. KITCHENS: Wiley Kitchens, 4 USGS, Gainesville, Florida. 5 MR. ROBINETTE: John Robinette, 6 U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Savannah 7 Coastal Refuge. 8 MR. WEBB: Russ Webb, U.S. Fish & 9 Wildlife Service, Savannah. 10 MR. BOSSART: Jon Bossart with 11 Applied Technology & Management. 12 MR. DYSART: Thank you. 13 If Will will help me remember, we 14 will introduce others who come in a 15 little bit later, because we want 16 everybody to be on the record. 17 Skipping right on to Item III, 18 you should have before you now the Draft 19 Agenda for this meeting. That reflects 20 all inputs through about 3:00 o'clock 21 yesterday afternoon. If you've had an 22 opportunity to look at it, let me know 23 your pleasure. We are open at this time 24 if there are additional items that need 25 to be added in the way of new business or 7 1 2 if anything was left off inadvertently, 3 let me know. 4 You can -- I presume that our 5 custom is that anybody who wants anything 6 on the agenda, it goes on there. These 7 have been requested. You can decide if 8 there is anything that bothers you. If 9 there is any desire to change the order, 10 we can discuss that. 11 The two major items today under 12 Old Business, the two major 13 presentations -- or the presenters or the 14 sponsors requested in each case one 15 hour. 16 And I presume, Wiley, will that 17 be including questions and answers or is 18 that just the presentation? 19 MR. KITCHENS: I'm not certain 20 about that. We plan to talk, basically, 21 30 minutes each. But I'm sure we can get 22 it done probably a little quicker than 23 that. 24 MR. DYSART: We certainly are not 25 interested in pushing on you, but I just 8 1 2 wanted an idea of what your anticipation 3 was. 4 Seems like the two major things 5 are those two presentations. And if you 6 need an hour, want to have some 7 discussion after that, that will be 8 fine. No problems on that. 9 So it seems that the major items, 10 the presenters and sponsors have 11 indicated what they needed in the way of 12 presentation. There will be adequate 13 discussion on these presentations so we 14 don't have too many big, wide open items 15 for today. 16 The adjournment time has been set 17 at noon. If this group, the members of 18 the SEG want to change that, they can. 19 Otherwise, it will be my presumption as 20 your facilitator that we will stick to 21 that. It seems people do not wish for 22 things to go on beyond scheduled time 23 unless you decide that you want to. 24 Anything that we need to do on 25 the agenda that has been circulated in 9 1 2 draft form for your review and 3 consideration? Is it acceptable to you? 4 Seeing a number of nodding in the 5 affirmative directions, we will assume 6 that the agenda -- Draft Agenda has been 7 accepted. 8 You've all had an opportunity to 9 review the transcript of the meeting from 10 May. Are there any changes, any action, 11 any recommendation concerning that? 12 Does this body wish to adopt it 13 or approve it as posted by Larry Keegan? 14 I see some nods. You all are 15 saving up for discussion questions for 16 Wiley. 17 So I will -- it is my belief, 18 then, that this body has adopted or 19 accepted or approved the transcript from 20 the last meeting. 21 Something that was pointed out to 22 me, we did clear the backlog last time 23 but the transcript did not indicate -- it 24 just said we cleared the backlog but it 25 did not indicate. I will simply add for 10 1 2 the record that that was the May 1999, 3 June 1999, July 1999 and August 1999 4 summaries that were approved by this body 5 last month, so that the record will be 6 clear. 7 Next item is Old Business. And 8 we're ready for the briefing by Wiley and 9 John. 10 Does anybody from Fish & Wildlife 11 Service wish to have any introductory 12 comments on this? 13 MR. ROBINETTE: Yes. Wiley 14 Kitchens has been working at the Savannah 15 Refuge out on those tidal marshes since 16 the middle '80s. That began during the 17 days when we were looking at the impacts 18 that the tide gate operations on the Back 19 River were having on our tidal marshes 20 and the striped bass community there, the 21 striped bass population. So he's 22 probably a resident expert on the 23 Savannah estuary, if there is one. 24 It's a very complicated system, 25 as you are fixing to find out, and these 11 1 2 guys have done some terrific work. 3 Jon and Wiley have coordinated 4 their research so that everything that 5 they are doing is compatible. And Jon 6 has -- works with ATM and he's pursuing a 7 Ph.D. at the University of Florida. And 8 he is also tied into the wetland studies 9 and they have dovetailed their study so 10 that they mesh very well together, and 11 we're getting some excellent results. 12 The thing that we don't have is 13 results from a normal flow year, because 14 we've been in this drought since May of 15 1998. So we have some good information 16 on worse-case scenario with the river at 17 about a third of the normal flow. 18 So we're continuing these studies 19 for an additional year, hoping that we're 20 going to get the rainfall. And Jon and 21 Wiley have worked hard to add additional 22 concepts to the study to overcome this, 23 even if we don't get the right -- a 24 normal rainfall to predict where that 25 tidal fresh marsh will be under normal 12 1 2 flow conditions, because that's the 3 definition of our tidal fresh marsh, is 4 the interstitial salinities at 0.5 parts 5 per thousand at normal flow. That's the 6 definition. 7 So that's what we're trying to 8 find. That's what these guys are trying 9 to nail down. It's an extremely 10 difficult job. It's very arduous. If 11 you've ever been out in that swamp, in 12 that marsh when it's hitting a hundred 13 degrees, you can understand what these 14 guys go through. 15 So they've done a fantastic job 16 for us and for GPA and we're proud to 17 have them here today and look forward to 18 bringing us up-to-date. 19 Dr. Kitchens? 20 MR. KITCHENS: Wow, with an 21 introduction like that... 22 MR. DYSART: Excuse me. We 23 discussed before we started that if there 24 is no objection within the group, except 25 for clarifications, we would like to go 13 1 2 through the full presentation and then 3 have questions then so that the members 4 could kind of get the flow of the full 5 presentation without interruption. But 6 clarifications are certainly welcome any 7 time. 8 Okay, Wiley. 9 MR. KITCHENS: Thank you. 10 As John mentioned, this is a 11 two-part presentation or at least a two 12 presenter presentation, Jon Bossart and 13 myself. And we are going to try to take 14 you from the past into the future with 15 what we know and what we don't know. And 16 believe me, there is plenty of 17 uncertainty. And I really want to 18 address that as well as the stuff that we 19 feel like we have a handle on. 20 Just to give you some sense of 21 the timeline here and the presentation 22 order, the tide gate, as most of you 23 know, went in in the mid '70s. We began 24 the UF studies, the stuff that I was 25 involved in directly here in the mid '80s 14 1 2 and carried that into right around the 3 end of the '80s, picked up again right 4 after the tide gate was taken out of 5 commission and then picked back up here 6 in '98 and carried through. 7 And, please, give me a little 8 license for the shaking hand. I've been 9 out -- and I explained this to Larry 10 earlier, I've been out in the marshes too 11 long too many times. 12 And Jon is going to pick up at 13 this point. He's going to pick up after 14 the tide gate was taken out of operation 15 and the harbor deepening had occurred, 16 present on some of the vegetation studies 17 that ATM conducted at that point in time, 18 and then we're going to discuss some of 19 the uncertainties that the drought has 20 brought to both our studies. 21 I'm going to -- later on in the 22 presentation series I'm going to do a 23 little Tide Gate 101 for those of you 24 that suffer from, as I do, from What's 25 His Name's Disease. Some of you may be 15 1 2 young enough not to remember that as 3 well. So on with the. 4 I think this is self 5 explanatory. 6 So what's the big deal? A couple 7 of points here that I want to bring to 8 your attention. The issue here is really 9 the ratio of marsh tides. We're not here 10 to disparage tidal saline marshes. 11 When I got involved in this, 12 there was a concern by the staff at the 13 Savannah National Wildlife Refuge that 14 there seemed to be a huge conversion of 15 the tidal fresh systems to tidal saline 16 marshes. 17 As you can see, over the entire 18 East Coast there is something in the 19 order of three-to-one ratio of salt to 20 fresh systems. In the Georgia/South 21 Carolina Coast, that ratio is something 22 like six-to-one. 23 So the fact of the matter is, the 24 tidal fresh systems are fairly -- they 25 are unique, and they are fairly rare, 16 1 2 compared to the tidal saline systems. 3 Now, a couple of the numbers here 4 in the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge 5 column of interest. There were, this is 6 again pre-tide gate era, some 23,000 7 acres of tidal fresh marshes or tidal 8 fresh wetlands prior to the tide gate. I 9 assure you, I took that data from one of 10 the Tiner publications and I can't really 11 defend this. This is a big picture point 12 of view. 13 When we did our study, and we 14 were concentrating solely on the wetlands 15 in the confines of the boundary of the 16 Savannah National Wildlife Refuge, and we 17 can only account for about 54,000 acres 18 of unimpounded wetlands. This may have 19 included forested wetlands and it may 20 have included stuff that was in 21 impoundments as well and stuff outside 22 the refuge at one point in time. I can't 23 deal with that. 24 But nevertheless, the point is 25 that a whole lot of whatever tidal fresh 17 1 2 wetlands that occurred on the coast of 3 Georgia and South Carolina was located in 4 this particular vicinity. And if that 5 value was correct, at one point in time a 6 hell of a lot of the proportion of what 7 was located on the East Coast, some six 8 percent of it, was right here, and about 9 a fifth of it for the whole Georgia/South 10 Carolina bite was right there on the 11 refuge. So it is a big deal. 12 Further, let's talk about the 13 values of that type marsh. It's pretty. 14 This is a picture of a tidal fresh 15 system. You can see the nice little 16 posies here. But that's not the point. 17 The point is, you can see the vegetative 18 diversity here, everything from the 19 flowers in the foreground to the trees in 20 the background. It's a huge, huge 21 vegetatively diverse system. 22 It's unaffected by the salts. 23 The stems, the leaves are palatable. 24 They are foraged by insects. They are 25 foraged by the mammals. 18 1 2 So the diversity you see there 3 ramifies through the whole web of life so 4 that the wildlife diversity there is 5 diverse. The wildlife fauna there is 6 diverse as well. 7 There is all kinds of seed 8 production. There is all kinds of 9 diversity in the various layers that you 10 see there, the canopy, if you will. So 11 there is all kinds of habitat. 12 And it's not -- this is not 13 Lanier's Marshes of Glynn by any stretch 14 of the imagination, but it is a very 15 beautiful and very valuable habitat. 16 And you can see that our 17 objectives, then, were to get at what 18 were the effects, really, of the tide 19 gate on the hydroelectric regime of the 20 Savannah system and how was that 21 translating into salinity changes out on 22 those marshes and what did it mean in 23 terms of the vegetative composition of 24 the marshes that occupied that 25 floodplain. 19 1 2 And we went about this in a 3 couple of ways. We wanted to look at it 4 in several kinds of time frame and 5 spatial domain. 6 Instead of "synoptic," and that 7 was a bad word to use there, we should 8 have used "daily," because this is -- 9 this is a snapshot for one day -- 10 actually two days. But we were trying to 11 get a picture of what was happening 12 spatially. 13 So we took advantage of two days 14 when we had a field -- several crews of 15 boats out over this entire network of the 16 whole complex. And as a matter of fact, 17 we were working collaboratively at that 18 point in time. We had crews from the 19 Army Corps of Engineers, the Fish & 20 Wildlife System, ATM was involved with us 21 at that point in time, and the University 22 of Florida, and I hate to admit this, but 23 even the University of Georgia. They 24 even knew how to operate boats. We were 25 a little bit surprised. 20 1 2 The point -- the point that I 3 want to bring to your attention here is 4 that we were interested in the upstream 5 displacement of the salt ledge, and that 6 being defined by the boundary between the 7 fresh and the saltwater system. And that 8 is the 0.5 parts per thousand salinity 9 isohyet line. And you can see that line 10 right there. 11 This is with the tide gate in 12 operation. Basically the river flow on 13 these two particular days. So it's for 14 all practical purposes the same. And you 15 can see on this day with the tide gate in 16 operation, that boundary is just about 17 there. And with the tide gate taken out 18 of operation, it is displaced some six 19 miles downstream. 20 Now, it doesn't take much rocket 21 science to figure that's an awful lot of 22 marsh between those two points, an awful 23 lot of acreage of marsh that's affected 24 by that change in boundary. 25 Now, we also did some information 21 1 2 synthesis. The Army Corps of Engineers 3 had files of data that had been taken 4 when they were running boats up and down 5 the Back River system at slack high tide 6 taking salinity measures over a number of 7 years, and I can't remember, it was 8 decades. Hence the word. 9 And what we were able to do was 10 look at regardless of the stage of the 11 river, if you extend these two lines 12 over, you see that there is about a 13 four-mile displacement of that same 14 boundary in the river, itself, the Back 15 River, itself, just over any stage of the 16 river you want to look at over a decade 17 in a kind of time frame with data that 18 proved. 19 And if you go to just a specific 20 point and you look at it for every day 21 15-minute increments for one year and you 22 look at that same boundary condition, 23 that 0.5 parts per thousand, right here 24 is that Lucknow Canal intake. And the 25 river is doing its thing, the stages 22 1 2 going all over. 3 But every time there is a spring 4 tide, and that's -- you can see the 5 stages going up and down up there on the 6 top graph -- that boundary is exceeded. 7 So we had saltwater intrusion at 8 that point, no matter the river stage, 9 every time a spring tide occurred, except 10 when the tide gate was taken out of 11 operation. So it was clearly affecting 12 the system, and grossly. 13 To get at what this meant to the 14 vegetation in place, we set up several 15 stations up and down that gradient of the 16 river to get -- to get a handle on what 17 this was doing to the marshes, 18 themselves. 19 And what we did was tried to 20 characterize the vegetation in place, 21 characterize what was going on in the 22 interstitial salinities at those 23 locations, as well as get a handle on the 24 sediment characteristics, the elevations 25 of the sites, and a feel for the 23 1 2 surrounding vegetation as well. 3 But this is a good point with 4 this slide to do the Tide Gate 101 5 refresher. 6 For those of you that need a 7 little bit of location information, this 8 is the Highway 17 bridge. There is 9 Hoolahan and I-95. Here is the tide 10 gate. Basically it is a one-way flap 11 valve. Water on an incoming tide would 12 enter both sets of channels here. The 13 entire tidal prism would be entrained 14 into the distributary system here. 15 On the ebbing tide, the gate 16 would slam shut and that entire volume of 17 water then would exit out -- well, new 18 cut was open at that time, would exit out 19 the Front River and it would serve to 20 scour, then, the sediments that were 21 accumulating in the Front River. It 22 would kind of self-scour the river out 23 and keep it fairly well clean of 24 sediments or it would reduce the dredging 25 that was required in the Front River. It 24 1 2 worked fine for that, but it was for all 3 practical purposes a big salinity pump. 4 Before, this whole system would 5 be water. Before all of the water would 6 get out of the Back River, another 7 incoming tide would start up the system 8 and start pushing whatever residual 9 saltwater was in here back up. So that 10 was why there was the huge displacement 11 of salt of the system. 12 I don't expect you to make out 13 all of the species names here, just look 14 at the pies. I really didn't get into 15 the salinity characterizations. I'll 16 break those out for you now. 17 On those sites that were 18 freshwater, the interstitial -- the 19 salinities in those soils never exceeded 20 on the average the 0.5 parts per 21 thousand. 22 At the intermediate sites, they 23 generally didn't exceed three parts per 24 thousand. In the brackish sites, 25 generally less than eight. And in the 25 1 2 subsaline, less than 18 parts per 3 thousand. 4 The take-home point of this whole 5 thing is look at the diversity as you go 6 downstream. 7 Since the tide gate is out, and 8 you will be most impressed with Jon's 9 presentation when he presents pie charts, 10 these things have just exploded. They 11 have -- it has become just tremendously 12 diverse. 13 Now I want to talk about 14 succession models that we developed to 15 try to get a handle on portraying some 16 scenarios of what would happen should the 17 tide gate be taken out. 18 This is back when we were trying 19 to get that done. And we put together a 20 succession model. And as fancy as that 21 sounds, it really isn't that much. 22 It's a two-part system. One of 23 those is nothing more than a fancy 24 statistical package that looks at the 25 data that we collected from those 26 1 2 vegetation sites. It basically takes 3 them through a loop that looks at the 4 species associations, the salinity 5 information for those sites, the sediment 6 information for those sites, the -- we 7 had some distances from the river and 8 distances from canal measures, some 9 measures of surrounding plant types as 10 well. And it takes it through the loop 11 several times. 12 And the whole intent here is to 13 develop an environmental signature for 14 that species of -- or that species 15 association, try to break it down as 16 finely or down to as fine a level as you 17 can for each of the species or species 18 associations as is possible. 19 And then the next step, then, is 20 to take it to a landscape level by 21 layering information in a GIS system 22 that's taken from running around in an 23 airboat, grabbing salinity samples over 24 the entire surface of that floodplain and 25 contouring it for the entire marsh so 27 1 2 that we know what the salinities are out 3 over the space of the floodplain, we know 4 what the soil types are, we know what the 5 elevations are so that we can predict 6 hydrologies, we know what the proximities 7 are to the different kinds of water 8 bodies. 9 And I didn't mention before, but 10 vegetation -- we know what the existing 11 vegetation was because we had taken 12 satellite imagery -- and this was from a 13 French satellite -- at 20-meter 14 resolution. And we had classified it 15 into the vegetative types that we had 16 done the ground truthing for at our 17 transect sites. 18 So we had -- we had vegetation 19 mapped on the ground, we had it typed in 20 meter square quadrats on the ground as 21 well, and we knew exactly why it was 22 there, because we had confirmed what the 23 driving force variables were that were 24 basically the species' requirements, the 25 species' preferences that our statistical 28 1 2 models had delineated for us. And this 3 is basically the results of that. And 4 I'll have to explain. 5 On the left is a crude summary of 6 that satellite imagery basically showing 7 the extent of that fresh marsh. 8 Now, the site that we have was 9 right up here, that fresh site, but we 10 were able to extend that, we were able to 11 extrapolate that to these sites here by 12 the satellite imagery that we had. 13 This is the intermediate. This 14 was the brackish. And this was the 15 subsaline marshes. 16 Now, by applying the succession 17 model in a scenario without the tide gate 18 in operation, this is what we showed 19 could be the result. The tidal fresh 20 system could have been expanded by 21 something on the order of 340 percent, 22 extending from 1,400 acres to something 23 approaching 5,600 acres, with the rest of 24 it in basically intermediate marsh 25 condition. That is without the harbor 29 1 2 deepening that followed the tide gate 3 being taken out. And this didn't account 4 for new cut being closed either. This 5 was just a scenario based on the 6 information we had where we were able to 7 have the tide gate open for six and eight 8 weeks at a time and get out and measure 9 salinity conditions, responses in the 10 marsh and track that and model for that. 11 Now, we want to -- we did 12 reciprocal transplanting. The modeling 13 information that I had presented was 14 based on correlations, statistical 15 correlations. 16 For those smokers among us, we 17 kind of -- we kind of staked our 18 longevity on the fact that a lot of that 19 information is only correlational. 20 Note: Cause and effect. 21 Well, this reciprocal transplant 22 experience allowed us to get at cause and 23 effect. We actually took marsh from the 24 various zones and moved it and followed 25 the responses. So this gave us an 30 1 2 opportunity to validate our statistical 3 studies and have confidence, then, that 4 we had rigorous information going for 5 us. 6 Now, the tide gate was taken out 7 of operation. This is a comparative -- 8 we went back in in '93, and this is again 9 before deepening occurred, and only a 10 couple of years after the tide gate had 11 been taken out of operation, and we did 12 just a quick comparison between some 13 stuff we had done in '84. And I'm not 14 going to bother you with all of the 15 species stuff, I just want -- again, I 16 want you to look at the pie slices, not 17 the -- not the names. And not a lot of 18 change in the fresh system. 19 There is in the intermediate 20 system. You begin to see that there are 21 more slices. It's becoming more 22 diverse. 23 Same thing in the brackish site. 24 It's picking up more species. And even 25 in the subsaline system, picking up more 31 1 2 species. So even in that short a period 3 of time, there were differences beginning 4 to occur. 5 But this is where the real 6 take-home point is. If you look at those 7 salinities there, this is the '84 8 condition, among those fresh, 9 intermediate -- I mean, fresh to 10 subsaline sites. And look at the 11 salinity reductions that had occurred. 12 Now, again, this was before the 13 deepening that followed the tide gate 14 being taken out. Which takes us to Jon's 15 presentation. 16 MR. BOSSART: Okay. Thank you, 17 Dr. Kitchens. Wiley is going to rest his 18 voice for a few minutes and I'm going to 19 run you through what we've been up to at 20 ATM and then Wiley will get back up and 21 talk about what his group at the 22 University of Florida is doing. 23 My name is Jon Bossart. I'm with 24 Applied Technology & Management. And I 25 got involved with this project in '97 32 1 2 when we did the marsh studies for the 3 Tier I study, which set the stage that 4 evolved into the studies that we're doing 5 right now. 6 And what we wanted to do this 7 morning was just run you through what are 8 all of the different tasks that we're 9 working on and what are we trying to get 10 out of them, what kind of data are we 11 getting and just kind of a status report 12 on where we are at with that. 13 At ATM, we've got three primary 14 tasks we are looking at. We've got 15 continued vegetation monitoring using the 16 transects that we set out in '97 as part 17 of the Tier I study, and we've just been 18 going out every year and monitoring those 19 transects. And some years we've actually 20 done them twice. So at the end of this 21 year, you know, we'll have done it for 22 five years in a row. 23 We also have out in the field a 24 hydrologic and salinity dynamic study 25 where we're looking at water levels and 33 1 2 tracking the salinity flows through the 3 river channels and up the tidal creeks 4 and as it floods over into marsh. 5 And also we have a nursery-based 6 study, a propagule and seed bank study 7 that we've got going on in a nursery 8 facility down in Gainesville in Florida 9 where our office is. And we'll touch a 10 little bit on that. 11 First I just want to talk about 12 what we're doing with our vegetation 13 monitoring, but let's review our study 14 area here real quick. 15 This is a satellite image of the 16 lower Savannah River system. This is 17 I-95 right here. And the tide gate sits 18 about right here. So if we cut away all 19 of this stuff and just leave the 20 vegetation that we're interested in, we 21 end up with an image like this. 22 This is Argyle Island, Ursula 23 Island. This is the Hoolahan Bridge and 24 causeway through here. Downtown Savannah 25 would be down through here. 34 1 2 When we laid out our vegetation 3 quadrats where we wanted to do our 4 permanent monitoring, we needed to 5 consider the salinity gradients that were 6 out there to make sure that we covered 7 the gamut of the gradient. 8 This is a gradient that came out 9 of some analysis in the Tier I study that 10 shows where the contours would be under 11 an 8200 cfs condition and where the 12 contours would be 50 percent of the 13 time. 14 So keep in mind these will move 15 upstream and downstream, depending on 16 river flow volume and tide stage. But 17 this gives a good little -- you know, on 18 average, this is where you can expect the 19 salinity gradient to be. 20 You can see it's at zero up in 21 the corner where Dr. Kitchens was just 22 showing that the original where the 23 remnant tidal freshwater marsh that they 24 were examining in their previous study 25 back in the '80s. This is the 35 1 2 all-important 0.5 ppt line, which is one 3 of the defining boundaries of tidal 4 freshwater marsh. 5 So with that in mind, we set out 6 ten permanent vegetation transects in 7 1987 at these locations scattered across 8 Argyle and Ursula Island and all the way 9 down to -- almost down to the tide gate, 10 which is right down here. This is 11 certainly the most saline site. A lot of 12 spartina alterniflora there and not a lot 13 of diversity. 14 All of our sites are set up the 15 same way. They are 500 feet in length. 16 They are permanently marked. And if you 17 are out in the field, they are marked by 18 these PVC poles so we can always go right 19 back to the exact same spot. 20 When we are monitoring them, we 21 stretch a tape measurer along those poles 22 and then every foot along that 500-foot 23 length we tally what species we find and 24 then note what the relative dominance 25 is. 36 1 2 And let's look at a little bit of 3 the data, just an example data from this 4 site here. This is our most diverse site 5 up in the freshwater area. This is what 6 the transect would look like on an aerial 7 photo. 8 Zero point is over next to the 9 river channel, extends 500 feet out into 10 the marsh. Note that it crosses this 11 clump of shrubbery here. It's a shrub 12 called alnus cerulata or alder. And then 13 it's marsh on either side of that. 14 Again, we would start at one end 15 of the transect, work our way to the 16 other tallying species and relative 17 dominance as we go. And we boil that 18 data down into charts which look like 19 this. And every species is listed 20 individually. 21 Let's zoom in on a little bit 22 closer area here. You can see each 23 species listed down the side. This is 24 the length of the quadrat across the top, 25 from zero next to the river channel to 37 1 2 500 feet out into the marsh. And for 3 every -- the way the chart is set up, you 4 can look at what occurs along every 5 10-foot interval in that quadrat. 6 For instance, you can see 7 Zizaniopsis, which is the Giant cut 8 grass, occurs pretty much in a 9 monoculture around the edges. 10 Here is that clump of alnus 11 cerulata out here in the middle. You can 12 see how it pretty much shades everything 13 else out. 14 Now, we've monitored these 15 quadrats for a number of years now and we 16 can take these charts and now line them 17 up against each other and then for each 18 individual area along the quadrats look 19 at what plants have come in or what 20 plants have dropped out in the time we've 21 been out there monitoring. 22 Next I want to touch on our 23 hydrologic and salinity dynamic study 24 that we have going. What we are trying 25 to do with this study is track salinity 38 1 2 that is carried, you know, up the river 3 in the river channels that's then 4 transferred into the tidal creeks. The 5 tidal creeks at high tide then overflow 6 into the marsh. And that marsh 7 floodwater, the salt that's carried up 8 into the marsh at that high tide, we want 9 to see what does it take to get that salt 10 from that floodwater down into the marsh 11 sediments and for the salt that gets into 12 the marsh sediments, what it takes to get 13 it back out and what does that mean in 14 terms of long-term vegetation changes. 15 So to get at these questions, 16 we've set out an array of these automatic 17 datalogging stations that we've got 18 deployed out into the marsh in a number 19 of locations. And each of them, all of 20 the equipment sits inside a weatherproof 21 closure. All the sensors are on long 22 cables so we can stretch them out to 23 different areas and get a good spatial 24 distribution all routed back to the same 25 datalogger. 39 1 2 We can take a quick look inside. 3 This is the actual datalogger right 4 here. It's really just two megabytes of 5 computer memory. And it's got a solar 6 panel and a battery right here. 7 This is just a big switch box 8 which all of the sensors are wired into 9 and it's the interface between all of the 10 sensors laying out in the marsh and the 11 datalogger. 12 The datalogger is set to take 13 readings every ten minutes. And we have 14 both salinity sensors and water level 15 sensors out in the marshes. 16 And then down here, this is a 17 cell phone and a cell phone modem, which 18 allows us to periodically just call these 19 stations up and download the data from 20 the comfort of our office back in 21 Gainesville and start playing with the 22 data. 23 So a typical setup out in the 24 marsh looks something like this. We have 25 our datalogger mounted on a pole out in 40 1 2 the marsh. It may be 200 or more feet 3 from the edge of the tidal creeks or the 4 river channels. 5 Out in the tidal creeks we would 6 have both salinity monitoring sensors and 7 water level sensors. This is a buoy that 8 we have a -- it's a YSI brand salinity 9 meter mounted to the buoy so it will go 10 up and down with the tide so it gives us 11 the salinity in the surface water, which 12 we're interested in as it floods over the 13 top of the marsh. 14 This is called an aquatape. It's 15 a water level monitoring sensor. And 16 inside this stand pipe is a -- it's a 17 metal ribbon. As the water rides up and 18 down on that ribbon, it changes the 19 electrical conductances and that's logged 20 in the datalogger as a water level. And 21 all our water levels were shot in using a 22 survey grade GPS, which gives us a very 23 high level of accuracy across the whole 24 study area. 25 Out in the marsh we monitor water 41 1 2 levels over the marsh surface using a 3 pressure transducer type sensor, which is 4 plugged into the marsh in a shallow well 5 that we dig in the marsh. It's not 6 particularly deep. 7 Now, out in the marsh we want to 8 be able to separate the salinity that's 9 in the root zone versus the salinity 10 that's in the marsh floodwater. So we 11 use two different censors. One is 12 mounted above ground and most of the time 13 it's just sitting in the air. And when 14 it's sitting in the air, it logs zero, 15 because the salinity of the air is zero. 16 But at high tide it will get covered with 17 water and start logging salinity and that 18 will be the salinity of the water that 19 flooded over the marsh. 20 The sensor that's down in the 21 sediments -- sediments are very 22 flocculent, so we've got them in these 23 gravel packed pill boxes that look like 24 that. And then those are mounted just 25 underneath the root zone of the marsh. 42 1 2 And you can see the other -- in the 3 schematic the other sensor that we've got 4 and that we had mounted up above ground 5 level. That's looking at the high tide 6 level. This one is monitoring what's 7 going on down here in the root zone. 8 If we -- let me talk a little bit 9 about that. The root zone and the root 10 mat. If you take some gear out and just 11 drag a core out of there and put it in a 12 clear plastic tube where you can look at 13 it, what you see is just a very thin zone 14 of roots, but it's a very dense, 15 intertwined matrix of roots that it's 16 actually hard to hack through, it gets so 17 thick. 18 But underneath that is just 19 unconsolidated peat and clay that just 20 grades down into pure clay. And the 21 whole bunch of it underneath that root 22 mat is unconsolidated and the root mat 23 just floats on it like a trampoline. So 24 when you are walking on it, you are 25 bouncing up and down on the thing. So 43 1 2 it's a very interesting place to work and 3 it makes it a little difficult to make 4 measurements out there. 5 But this root zone, that's what 6 we are trying to monitor the salinity 7 levels, right in that root zone. 8 Okay. Let's look a little bit at 9 the data that we're getting from this 10 system. Let's compare what's going on in 11 the tidal creek versus what's going on 12 several hundred feet away out in the 13 marsh. 14 This comes from -- this data 15 comes from a site along the Middle River 16 just north of the Hoolahan Bridge. The 17 tidal creek readings are from about right 18 in here and the marsh readings are from 19 about right in here. 20 What this is showing, this is 21 about a seven-day period of record. 22 Along the Y axis here is just the water 23 level in feet from zero to seven feet. 24 It's a pretty good tide range out there. 25 The dotted line is the ground surface out 44 1 2 in the marsh. And at this point -- at 3 this spot it is about 4.7 feet. 4 The blue line is the data that's 5 coming from that aquatape we have 6 monitored out in the tidal creek and it's 7 catching the high tides. And then it 8 comes down, it's flat at the bottom, 9 because the creek is going dry at low 10 tide. So we're catching the high tides 11 and then the whole creek dries out. 12 The red line that you see 13 superimposed on here is the water level 14 out in the marsh at the same time that 15 we're monitoring what's going on in the 16 tidal creek. 17 So the interesting thing to 18 notice here is how high the water needs 19 to get in the tidal creek before you see 20 any flooding out in the interior of the 21 marsh. And this is due to just the 22 density of the grass out there and the 23 friction and how much head you need to 24 get on the water with the high tide to be 25 able to push the water through all of 45 1 2 this grass to get it out into the middle 3 of the marsh. 4 The next thing is even, you know, 5 with time, the water level out in the 6 middle of the marsh never gets to the 7 same elevation as the water in the tidal 8 creeks, because by -- it takes so long to 9 get the water out in the middle of the 10 marsh, the water is in the tidal creeks. 11 The tide starts going out, the water 12 starts coming back out of the marsh. So 13 the middle of the marsh never gets as 14 deep as the tidal creeks around it. 15 This is data, same station, just 16 a few days later in the record, a few 17 days later in the lunar cycle. So 18 instead of a spring tide, we've got a 19 neap tide going. And you can see that 20 although the blue line shows that the 21 water in the tidal creeks is coming up 22 above the ground surface of the marsh, 23 our water level recorders out in the 24 marsh show that for days at a time the 25 marsh doesn't flood, it just remains 46 1 2 saturated, but there is no flooding depth 3 to it all. 4 Let's look at a little salinity 5 data. This comes from the station out in 6 the Middle River adjacent to the site we 7 were just looking at. This is a 90-day 8 record here that goes over several full 9 and new moon cycles. 10 The salinity range over in the 11 Y axis goes from zero to eight parts per 12 thousand. You can see we are getting 13 spikes of over eight parts per thousand 14 out in the river in the Middle River 15 north of the Hoolahan Bridge. 16 What does that mean for what's 17 going on in the marsh? We're going to 18 focus in on just this part of the 19 record. And this is out in the marsh. 20 The salinity range goes from zero 21 to eight again. The red spikes are the 22 salinity readings taken from that sensor 23 that's mounted above ground that only 24 reads salinity data, only collects 25 salinity data when the marsh floods and 47 1 2 there is water over that sensor, so that 3 the tendency is to look at that as a 4 tidal signal, but it's really just the 5 water was deep enough to flood the sensor 6 and then it basically turned on. When 7 the water drops back down, it turns off 8 and it's back to logging zero. 9 So this is the salinity of the 10 marsh floodwaters. The green line is the 11 salinity in the pill box that's mounted 12 down there in the root zone. So that's 13 the root zone salinity. 14 And you can compare, you get 15 what's going on in the marsh. We are 16 getting spikes of over five, but the root 17 zone, we get a slight increase in this 18 period of record, but it barely gets over 19 three. 20 And if we take the previous data 21 from the meter that was out in the river 22 and superimpose it on top of the graph I 23 was just showing you, we looked at it all 24 together, we can compare what's going on 25 out in the river versus what the 48 1 2 floodwaters in the marsh are versus 3 what's going on in the sediments all at 4 one time. 5 So that's the kind of data we're 6 collecting at this point. And our 7 hydrodynamic modelers are now crunching. 8 We've got enough data record now where 9 they can start crunching the data and 10 they're looking for, you know, what's 11 that magic relationship between all of 12 these different compartments where the 13 salinity is that we can then use to put 14 into the salinity model and come up with 15 a spatial predictor of salinity out in 16 the marshes. 17 Finally, just wanted to show you 18 a few quick pictures of the propagule and 19 seed bank study that we have going on 20 down in our nursery facility down in 21 Gainesville. 22 We collected samples from the 23 marsh at these six locations on Ursula 24 Island and Argyle Island. Each sample 25 site we dragged 24 samples out of there, 49 1 2 and it would be in a distribution that 3 would look something like that. 4 Each sample was basically about 5 the size of a piece of sod you would lay 6 in your front yard. And we cut it out of 7 the marsh with a saw and yanked it out of 8 there and hauled that back to Gainesville 9 in a refrigerated truck and marked the 10 locations of where we dragged all of the 11 samples out using our GPS gear. 12 Back at the nursery we then 13 prepared them and put them all in pots, 14 which we then put in tubs which are -- 15 have different salinities in them. We 16 are using zero, point five and two ppt 17 and we are doing stem counts and species 18 identification of all of the individual 19 pots that we have sitting in these tubs. 20 And we hope to get this -- get the data 21 collection part of this wrapped up in 22 August and then we can start on the data 23 analysis. 24 And I think that's my last 25 slide. Yes. Okay. Now I will turn it 50 1 2 back over to Dr. Kitchens and he will run 3 you through the tasks that he's working 4 on. 5 MR. KITCHENS: I was going to 6 substitute, and did in fact have a 7 substitute slide for this, and it was 8 entitled "Back To The Future." But I was 9 the only person that thought that was 10 funny at all, so I took it out. 11 The fact of the matter is, this 12 system is incredibly dynamic. The fact 13 that there are all kinds of 14 reconfiguration of the channels, the fact 15 that there is an enormous drought 16 occurring has made characterizing this 17 system a horrendous task. 18 I had been involved, John said, a 19 whole lot longer than I care to think 20 about, but I can tell you that every time 21 we walk out there, we learn something 22 else. And it's very -- it's kind of 23 sobering. 24 And for that reason, we've 25 embarked on what you see there, a litany 51 1 2 of new studies. And a lot of it is some 3 continued stuff. And therefore it's kind 4 of back to the future. 5 And I'm going to touch on each of 6 these and I hope in a fairly brief way. 7 But you can keep me honest at the end 8 with some questions. 9 Continued vegetation studies. 10 The objectives. Again, I think I've 11 touched on why. It's this whole business 12 of the system having been changed very 13 radically. 14 In addition to the studies that 15 we had conducted in the past, now we're 16 trying to go in and do biannual 17 sampling. We are going in early in the 18 growing season and we are going in late 19 in the growing season. 20 There is one thing about these 21 type marshes, they change very radically 22 over the growing season. The species 23 composition is very vastly different in 24 the spring than it is in the fall. 25 You can go out there and take 52 1 2 samples in the fall and you will not 3 recognize that marsh if you go back 4 out -- or if you had been there in the 5 spring. 6 Therefore, we decided in addition 7 to that, that we would -- that we would 8 select some sites and monitor them 9 monthly. We felt like we needed to get a 10 handle on that, that temporal change 11 that's occurring out there, so that we 12 could monitor -- so that we could model 13 as well as monitor and get a good handle 14 on the kind of changes that are occurring 15 across the gradient of marsh types. 16 And in addition to getting a 17 better handle on the temporal frequency 18 of change, we also added a new spatial 19 component as well. We added three more 20 sample areas, one off the Front River 21 here and two more off of the Middle 22 River. And of course we kept our four 23 transects off the Back. 24 This is the type sampling that we 25 had done in the past. I didn't refer to 53 1 2 this back in the pre-tide gate era 3 portion of the study, but we have 4 concentrated back in the estuarine part 5 of the system. We've not been interested 6 in what's going on here at the river 7 berm. We've tried to be concerned with 8 what's going on in the interior marshes 9 almost solely. 10 And at each one of these sites, 11 you can see that we've set them up with 12 double-nested wells. These are the 13 points from which we take our salinity 14 measures down in the root zones of the 15 marshes, themselves. From this point we 16 throw a hoop randomly, take a quarter 17 meter square sample of the vegetation, we 18 cut the vegetation down to the substrate 19 floor, itself, bag the stuff up, take it 20 to Gainesville. You will see what we do 21 with it there. 22 We also take samples of the 23 substrates -- my voice just doesn't hold 24 up when I'm shouting. My wife would not 25 agree with that. But we take substrate 54 1 2 samples back to the lab for analysis as 3 well. 4 You get some sense of what those 5 bagged samples look like. We count the 6 stems, we identify the species, we dry 7 them, we weigh them for biomass content. 8 This allows us to apportion relative 9 Importance Values for each of those 10 species. 11 This is -- this gives you some 12 sense of how the data is treated. I 13 mentioned some of the statistical 14 processes that we put this through. This 15 is just to give you an idea of what that 16 looks like once it's gone through one of 17 the packages. 18 The transplanting experiments. 19 My favorite. I've already mentioned the 20 relevance of this. That objective 21 doesn't come close to describing it. It 22 really is to add the cause and effect and 23 to validate the statistical correlations 24 that we've done. 25 We went through a very rigorous 55 1 2 process this time. We used the computer 3 to generate random locations for donor 4 sites at each of the samples that -- or 5 at each of the sites that we're taking 6 our monthly samples from. So we know 7 what the vegetation is at that place 8 year-round, basically. 9 At that site we take really four 10 square meters of marsh. And as Jon 11 described, we took out sod blocks. They 12 are a quarter meter square. And each one 13 of those sod blocks -- and we can see 14 one, it's sitting on I guess that's a 15 piece of plywood, ready to be dragged off 16 to a boat to be again randomly placed at 17 a recipient site somewhere on one of the 18 other four transects along the Back 19 River. 20 Now, sixteen square meters of 21 marsh, four from each one of our 22 transects, is an awful lot of marsh to 23 move. This is an enormous task, and 24 particularly when it's all being done 25 randomly. So it's a big crisscross of 56 1 2 marsh moving. 3 I can't leave here without 4 mentioning that it was rumored that this 5 past January that there was a mud 6 wrestling event, I think, that occurred 7 in one of these transplant pits between 8 one of my students and one of our field 9 techs that may or may not be present here 10 today. Anyhow, there has to be some 11 fun. 12 This is one of the recipient 13 sites. It doesn't look like much there. 14 That's right after it was placed in the 15 ground. And that site has a quarter 16 meter square block from each of the four 17 donor sites from the other four transects 18 right there in place. 19 It has a -- it has about -- it 20 has a plastic boundary that keeps it from 21 being invaded by the surrounding marsh 22 here, but each of -- that's not true. It 23 has a boundary that crosses through here 24 to keep the four from interacting that 25 way, but it does interact with the marsh 57 1 2 that surrounds it. 3 You can see what it looks like a 4 little bit later. Instead of the 5 greenhouse, our site -- our greenhouse 6 is -- our nursery is the field, in this 7 case, and we count the stems and species, 8 note the species composition over time 9 and place. 10 Continued salinity monitoring. I 11 think this is self explanatory. I've 12 mentioned that we have monitoring in 13 place. Each of the sites that we do our 14 monthly vegetation monitoring at has a 15 wire-side salinity sauna in place. The 16 data is collected, downloaded and brought 17 back to the lab and monitored. 18 This is one of those wells at one 19 of those sites. You can see that we've 20 taken pains to stabilize that platform. 21 The intent is to let the marsh grass grow 22 up through these holes so that the 23 platform is stabilized. It has a vented 24 system so that we have a pressure 25 transducer in there that measures the 58 1 2 fluctuations and water level as well. So 3 we get the water level change and 4 salinity at the same time. 5 This is a promotional slide for 6 YSI. That might be one of the mud 7 wrestlers. 8 And it is interesting that our 9 female field techs seem to be involved in 10 more of the computer level work than some 11 of the guys. And you will see that later 12 too. 13 Again, filling in the spaces 14 between the stations, we take an 15 airboat -- this is part of that business 16 of defining the landscape. We take an 17 airboat, go out and take salinity samples 18 on a grided network so that we can fill 19 in the gaps. 20 I'm not sure if that's Sasquatch 21 Big Foot or another one of the students. 22 Believe me, there are more scientists out 23 there than there are wildlife. We do 24 have to avoid hitting them. 25 There is another very important 59 1 2 element to the work we're doing, and one 3 that we feel that we ignored previously 4 and we're trying to capture that now. 5 There is a living legacy that we feel 6 that may well have captured the history 7 of all of the hydrologic changes that 8 have occurred out there, and that is the 9 tidal forests. 10 And as you can see, we are 11 looking at these forests in an attempt to 12 see if we can pick that up in the various 13 age structure of the forest out there to 14 see if in fact there is a record in the 15 various layers of the forest that we can 16 trace back to some of the events that 17 have occurred in the harbor and its 18 development through time. 19 Some of the methodology involved, 20 using belt transects. We also have well 21 sites in place monitoring salinities and 22 what have you. 23 The salinity characterization 24 mapping is a little bit out of place. 25 This should have been following the 60 1 2 salinity -- spatial salinity sampling as 3 well. Same kind of thing, filling in the 4 gaps between the stations. 5 But again, I make my point. Here 6 is one of our male field techs, and look, 7 playing patty cakes or mud cakes here in 8 the lab with the substrate samples. 9 But in all seriousness, this is 10 very serious work. We feel that the 11 substrates have a very definite influence 12 on the vegetative types that occupy those 13 sites. There is a definite interaction. 14 And this is one of the upgrades to the 15 work that has been done and we feel that 16 this is going to be a big improvement to 17 the modeling effort that's underway now. 18 In addition to the very fine 19 scaled work that we're doing on the 20 ground, we're also doing some more 21 satellite image comparison. This is a 22 2000/2001 image that we can overlay with 23 an '86/'87 image. And by registering 24 them very closely and filtering out 25 effects of things like, oh, I guess it's 61 1 2 smog and stuff like that, you can 3 actually pick up changes in the signature 4 of the basic vegetation types. Although 5 we don't know what those are, at least we 6 can pick out zones of change and then go 7 in on the ground and try to identify what 8 those are. So this is the first attempt 9 at that. 10 Getting back to the modeling 11 task, itself, this is something that we 12 and ATM are doing jointly. You've seen 13 Jon's explanation of the very fine work 14 that they are doing with the salinity and 15 the hydrology work. This is absolutely 16 breakthrough stuff. It's got to help the 17 modeling effort big time. 18 We are working with the soil 19 stuff. We feel like that's a big 20 upgrade. The combined vegetation work is 21 certainly a big improvement over what was 22 done in the mid '80s. We feel like we 23 are making breakthrough strides 24 everywhere in this whole process and we 25 look forward to a much better modeling 62 1 2 effort than we were able to put 3 through -- or put together back in the -- 4 well, a decade ago. 5 In addition to all of this 6 vegetation and hydrology work, we have 7 added a resource component to this. And 8 it's about time. We wanted to look at 9 how birds and fish are using these 10 marshes differentially. 11 And to do that, we've looked at 12 peak migration usage of migratory birds 13 across the gradient of marshes. And some 14 of this is very self explanatory, I 15 hope. 16 This is the Savannah Sparrow -- 17 I'm sorry, Seaside Sparrow that is caught 18 up in the mist net. You can see we set 19 these up at sites along the Back River 20 and we also included one site at the 21 Wright River to have an even more saline 22 site than our subsaline site that was 23 Back River forest. 24 We banded the birds so that we 25 would know how many were caught more than 63 1 2 once. We really were interested in the 3 migratory birds that were coming 4 through. 5 This is a summary. You can get 6 some sense of what was going on. 7 This work is still underway. We 8 have at least another year of this to 9 continue. 10 In addition to that, we are 11 looking at the fish that utilize these 12 marsh, the -- and I'm sure you can 13 appreciate that these are not a very 14 large fish. Believe it or not, there is 15 a net here. This is a bottomless lift 16 net. The objective is again to determine 17 the community composition of the fish 18 that use this gradient of marsh types 19 from the fresh down to the subsaline 20 systems. 21 We are using two types of nets. 22 This is the bottomless lift net that's 23 deployed. It's deployed at high tide. 24 It basically is nothing more than a rim 25 of a net with this part of the net buried 64 1 2 in the substrates. It's pulled at dead 3 high tide and left to drain on low tide. 4 It has a pan in a depression down here. 5 And miraculously all the little fish end 6 up in the pan at dead low tide and you go 7 in and net them out. And there is some 8 little depression there around the 9 perimeter of the net rim and we simply 10 net those out. 11 We also have some flume nets. 12 These are more qualitative than 13 quantitative. The other gives us actual 14 abundance, because it is a prescribed 15 area of the marsh. This doesn't do 16 this. This net captures everything that 17 passes through that point either way. It 18 basically is a vertical slit right here 19 that funnels everything into a trap 20 that's placed right back here. It's very 21 effective. It simply catches everything 22 that goes through there, including water 23 moccasins, I hear. 24 The samples are sorted. We keep 25 them on ice. We try to be humane with 65 1 2 this. 3 And here you are, it's -- I 4 describe this as a veritable bait shop. 5 Again, nothing very big, but you get some 6 sense of the kind of stuff that are using 7 these sites. Nothing like the stripers 8 I'm sure you are going to hear about 9 later. 10 And I can't leave you with that 11 carnage. The required sunset shot. 12 And that's it. 13 Do we take questions now on this 14 or wait? 15 MR. DYSART: Yes, I would 16 recommend that we have questions on this 17 presentation now. We need to do some 18 switching over in the next presentation. 19 Is it likely anyone is going to want to 20 go back to these slides? 21 MR. KITCHENS: We have them 22 memorized. 23 MR. DYSART: Questions, 24 clarifications, comments? 25 MR. KYLER: I have a question on 66 1 2 terminology. When you were showing 3 drawing the samples, grasses, vegetation 4 from the marsh, you were talking about 5 measuring biomass. I think you used the 6 term "importance." Did you mean 7 "dominance"? What do you mean by 8 "importance"? 9 MR. KITCHENS: Importance Value? 10 MR. KYLER: Yes. 11 MR. KITCHENS: It's a measure 12 that takes into account dominance, 13 density and one other measure. It's a 14 composite value that has about three 15 factors associated with it, not just 16 dominance. 17 MR. KYLER: So it wasn't just a 18 cavalier use of the term, it has very 19 special -- 20 MR. KITCHENS: Oh, yes, it does. 21 It's a plant ecology term. It's I-V, 22 Importance Value. 23 MS. JENNINGS: Wiley, elaborate 24 for me. I imagine you said it and I 25 didn't get it. I'm not sure what you're 67 1 2 looking for when you do the transplants 3 from donor sites. You say the vegetation 4 can interact with the marsh where you put 5 it. What are you looking for? I mean, 6 are you trying to -- 7 MR. KITCHENS: If it's going to 8 respond to the new regime, the new 9 hydrologic regime. 10 If we take marsh from the fresh 11 site -- you see what that looks like, 12 again, with all the different fresh 13 species there. If we take that and move 14 it down to what was that subsaline site, 15 what is it going to look like in two 16 years? 17 MS. JENNINGS: How close are 18 the -- like you transplant from the 19 different sites. Are they different 20 sites or are they four segments from a 21 similar donor site or are they different 22 donor sites? 23 MR. KITCHENS: The donor sites -- 24 there are four donor sites. There is a 25 fresh donor site, an intermediate donor 68 1 2 site, brackish donor site and a subsaline 3 donor site. 4 MS. JENNINGS: You put all four 5 of those in another spot? 6 MR. KITCHENS: Right. No, we 7 don't put them all in one site. We 8 mix -- we mix all sixteen blocks among 9 the four recipient areas. So you have 10 one-fourth of each recipient area has one 11 of those pieces in it. 12 MS. JENNINGS: Okay. 13 MR. KITCHENS: It's very 14 complex. I mean, you have to keep track 15 of every little quarter-meter square 16 block. It has a number and it's randomly 17 assigned, but it goes to one of those. 18 It's random, but it's stratified 19 random. It has to go -- one of those has 20 to go to the fresh, one has to go to the 21 intermediate and one of them has to go 22 right back to the subsaline, for example, 23 if that's where it came from. 24 MS. JENNINGS: Okay. 25 MR. KITCHENS: You have to 69 1 2 transplant back too. 3 MS. JENNINGS: All right. So I 4 understand, so it's random but you do one 5 of each? 6 MR. KITCHENS: It's stratified 7 random. Sorry. 8 MS. JENNINGS: No, I didn't get 9 it. 10 MR. MOORE: How are they 11 responding when you move them? 12 MR. KITCHENS: Well, you saw -- I 13 haven't seen the data. We just looked at 14 them in June. 15 MR. MOORE: So you are just 16 beginning? 17 MR. KITCHENS: But previously 18 when we did it with the tide gate, they 19 corresponded exactly as you would have 20 expected. When you took the subsaline 21 sites and moved them up to the fresh, 22 they turned fresh. And conversely. 23 MR. KYLER: Another question. 24 Does any of this -- I assume it does 25 that -- speak to the problems of 70 1 2 mitigation we're trying to replace or 3 upgrade wetlands that have been damaged 4 or destroyed? 5 MR. KITCHENS: Possibly with the 6 modeling effort, yes. 7 MR. KYLER: Do you have any 8 comments -- 9 MR. KITCHENS: Oh, it's too early 10 for that. 11 MR. KYLER: -- about the historic 12 problems with mitigation, establishing a 13 stable wetlands community? 14 MR. KITCHENS: Well, I don't want 15 to get drawn out of a political closet on 16 that. No. We've got technical stuff 17 going here. I have my own opinions 18 about -- 19 MR. KYLER: We'll talk later. 20 But this will -- presumably this work 21 will help improve the ability to 22 mitigate? 23 MR. KITCHENS: Oh, yeah. 24 Particularly for this. I don't see any 25 problem at all. Yeah. It's ideal for 71 1 2 that. 3 MR. DYSART: Judy, follow-up? 4 MS. JENNINGS: Thank you. I just 5 didn't know about the temporal -- I'm 6 sorry, the temporal diversity that you 7 mentioned, like, you know, the spring and 8 the fall, the diversity of the species. 9 MR. KITCHENS: Oh, it's 10 incredible. 11 MS. JENNINGS: Do you -- do they 12 react similarly to changes in salinity? 13 Did you say that? 14 MR. KITCHENS: Yeah. 15 MS. JENNINGS: I mean, like is 16 the spring more sensitive or the fall 17 less sensitive? 18 MR. KITCHENS: Yes. 19 MS. JENNINGS: Can you make the 20 characterization? 21 MR. KITCHENS: In the saltier 22 part of the gradient, you don't see as 23 much turnover as you do in the fresh 24 part. For example -- 25 MS. JENNINGS: Is that the same 72 1 2 temporally, spring and fall? 3 MR. KITCHENS: Yes. 4 MS. JENNINGS: It is. So there 5 is not much difference how they react? 6 MR. KITCHENS: I may be answering 7 you incorrectly, but what I'm saying is 8 if you visit the intermediate and fresher 9 side of the system, if you are up there, 10 all of the flora that you see on the 11 river bank and all of the wild rice that 12 is there in the late fall is gone in the 13 winter and not there in the spring and 14 doesn't come back until again the late 15 fall. And it's replaced by other 16 species. 17 The Southern Wild-rice comes in 18 big time early. Now my What You Call It 19 Disease is kicking in again. It's 20 totally species replacement. It's very, 21 very interesting. 22 And so you will see some of the 23 dead stems, but the live stuff just comes 24 through. And we -- we actually will bet 25 each other. You know, we'll go in and 73 1 2 I've just been there this fall and 3 someone will tell me, "You know, that 4 was" -- whatever the species was. And, 5 "You are out of your mind." And they 6 will bet me. And we will go out there in 7 the spring and there it was. So it's 8 just amazing. It's just incredibly 9 diverse, temporally. 10 MS. JENNINGS: Temporally. I 11 guess what I was saying: If you take 12 temporal, you've got them both, and then 13 you change -- pretend you can have the 14 temporal -- 15 MR. KITCHENS: Yeah. 16 MS. JENNINGS: You've got 17 laboratory conditions and you change the 18 salinity. Is one set of species going to 19 react more than the other? 20 MR. KITCHENS: Yes. 21 MS. JENNINGS: The spring or the 22 fall? 23 MR. KITCHENS: Yes. 24 MS. JENNINGS: Yes? 25 MR. KITCHENS: They will. 74 1 2 MS. JENNINGS: Really? That's 3 interesting. 4 MR. MOORE: I am really showing 5 my ignorance, but are most of these 6 things perennials or annuals? Are they 7 being germinated from seeds or from the 8 rhizomes in the root mass? 9 MR. KITCHENS: Yes. 10 MR. MOORE: Yeah, all of that? I 11 mean, it's all of them; is that right? 12 So what changes at best has to be like an 13 annual or from seed production. What 14 doesn't change is from the root bed. I 15 didn't realize it was that way. 16 MR. KITCHENS: It's all of the 17 above. And you have more perennials in 18 the saline system and more annuals in the 19 fresh system. But you have them both. I 20 mean, I'm just saying predominance is one 21 over the other. But it's all -- it's all 22 out there and it's all interacting. It's 23 very, very complex. 24 MR. MOORE: When you take a 25 saltwater block and put it in freshwater, 75 1 2 a lot of that is coming from sea -- 3 rather from the adjacent area and that 4 what is there is dying out, basically? 5 MR. KITCHENS: But don't forget 6 that you have seeds in the river too. So 7 we have seeds coming all the way down -- 8 seeds, we call it rain-out or whatever. 9 I mean, there is flow-through there 10 that's carrying seeds all the time, 11 constantly. Plus the tides bring them 12 up. So you've got this kind of thing. 13 So there is plenty of seed disbursement 14 going on. 15 MR. HANZALIK: Based on what 16 you're saying, could it -- could you 17 interpolate the information that you've 18 gotten so far to say that the marsh is 19 pretty diverse and over the course of a 20 long period of time things have changed 21 within the marsh, itself, as far as the 22 salinity and the freshwater and based on 23 weather, climatic changes and other 24 things? And would that be the same -- 25 what I'm trying to get at is has there 76 1 2 been that big a change between let's say 3 what happened when they deepened the 4 harbor in '86 and what's happening 5 today? 6 MR. KITCHENS: Yeah. 7 MR. HANZALIK: Has there been a 8 big change and have those changes been 9 more -- 10 MR. KITCHENS: Yes. 11 MR. HANZALIK: Is it a 12 detrimental change or a good change or a 13 bad change? Can you say that? 14 MR. KITCHENS: No. But it's 15 changing. It's changing today. 16 MR. HANZALIK: And you're 17 saying -- 18 MR. KITCHENS: And yet you go out 19 there and you see the same stuff. You 20 know, it's subtle changes, but you still 21 see a lot of the same stuff. The 22 proportions change. And that's the kind 23 of thing, until you get into the 24 proportion of what's there -- you can't 25 just say "species" and you can't just use 77 1 2 that pie chart. You've got to look at 3 the proportions of things. You've got to 4 look at those Importance Values or you 5 miss it. Yeah, it's -- it's -- it's not 6 easy. No, no. Believe me. 7 MR. DYSART: Will? 8 MR. BERSON: I think you came 9 very close to asking the question I was 10 going to ask. If I understood you 11 correctly, the last harbor deepening 12 intervened in your ability to validate 13 your assumptions on salinity by 14 decommissioning the tide gate. So you 15 had some assumptions and had the last 16 harbor deepening not happened, you could 17 have done a retrospect and seen what 18 happened. Is that accurate? No? 19 MR. KITCHENS: I would love to be 20 able to say that. You know, I have a 21 good out because harbor deepening 22 occurred. That's all I can say. 23 MR. BERSON: The predicate of my 24 question was: So based on that, can you 25 guesstimate what the salinity impact of 78 1 2 the last harbor deepening was? 3 MR. KITCHENS: All I can -- well, 4 you saw what the salinities were after 5 the tide gate was out, before new cut was 6 closed based on two days of salinity 7 information. 8 Now, I could be real foolish and 9 stand up here and say, "That would have 10 been it." I'm not going to do that. 11 MR. BERSON: I wasn't really 12 asking you to. 13 MR. KITCHENS: I know. I mean, 14 that would be tempting to do. It 15 certainly freshened up, at least when we 16 were out there. I can't tell you what 17 the river flow was even then. I haven't 18 looked at it that closely. That wouldn't 19 be prudent. 20 MR. BERSON: Let me ask another 21 question. I just thought of it, so 22 please excuse me. I shouldn't intervene 23 my brain between my mouth. 24 In the relative mix, was the tide 25 gate and the harbor deepening a wash? 79 1 2 Did salinity move upstream -- if you take 3 both of those into account, since we 4 can't really pull out the two -- 5 MR. KITCHENS: I won't say it was 6 a wash, but I would say it certainly 7 mitigated a lot of the benefits that were 8 accrued. I would say that. 9 MR. BERSON: From removing the 10 tide gate? 11 MR. KITCHENS: Yeah, I would say 12 it was. Based on my expectation, my 13 naive expectation and my look at what the 14 salinities were, yeah. Not a wash. 15 MR. BERSON: A net detriment? 16 I'm sorry, I won't -- 17 MR. KITCHENS: Don't put words in 18 my mouth. 19 MR. BERSON: No, I won't. 20 MR. KITCHENS: If she weren't 21 here. 22 MR. BERSON: I'm just really 23 trying to understand. I'm not trying to 24 peg anybody. I'm just trying to -- 25 MR. KITCHENS: No, but it is 80 1 2 surprising. And I think that harbor 3 deepening did have a much larger impact 4 than we expected, yeah. And I think our 5 model was pretty right on, because we -- 6 when the tide gate was open and the Army 7 Corps opened it for several months for us 8 and we did get out and we did measure the 9 salinity reductions in the marsh, the 10 system freshened up pretty well. 11 MR. DYSART: Bill Bailey. 12 MR. BAILEY: Wiley, is there -- 13 historically was that a rice plantation 14 where you're looking into? 15 MR. KITCHENS: (Nods head.) 16 MR. BAILEY: Before that it had 17 been forest or was it wetlands? Was it 18 spartina before that? Do you have any 19 idea? 20 MR. FLOCK: Prior to it being a 21 rice plantation? 22 MR. BAILEY: Yeah. 23 MR. KITCHENS: It was -- it 24 wasn't spartina, but it was -- it was 25 tidal fresh, mostly. Yeah, because there 81 1 2 was cypress and -- 3 MR. DYSART: What was your answer 4 to the question was it a rice 5 plantation? I noticed you moving your 6 head, but -- 7 MR. KITCHENS: Yes. Yeah, there 8 were canals and berms and dikes and -- 9 over the whole thing. 10 MR. DYSART: Are there further 11 questions? John. 12 MR. ROBINETTE: I was just going 13 to ask Wiley and Jon, in reference to 14 Will's question about the impact from 15 deepening as opposed to the impacts from 16 taking the tide gate out of operation and 17 filling in the new cut, would you have a 18 much better picture of that if we can get 19 to a normal flow regime at this time next 20 year? You will have a much better 21 picture and be able to separate those two 22 a little better with another year, 23 especially if we could get to a normal 24 flow regime? 25 MR. KITCHENS: We might be able 82 1 2 to refine a bit more. I just -- I don't 3 know right now, John. Ask me next year. 4 MR. ROBINETTE: Okay. 5 MR. DYSART: Morgan Rees. 6 MR. REES: If I may just ask for 7 a clarification, really, to what Will was 8 saying. I was trying to follow the 9 discussion there and I thought I 10 understood Will to ask the question: Is 11 the area now more fresh or more saline 12 than it was before the tide gate was 13 removed and the channel was deepened? 14 I understand we don't have any 15 distinction between the effects of the 16 tide gate alone versus the channel 17 deepening alone, but between the two of 18 them, is that area now more fresh or more 19 saline? 20 MR. KITCHENS: Which area are you 21 talking about? 22 MR. REES: Where you were 23 studying in the marsh and the area of 24 concern on the refuge. Or can we say -- 25 MR. ELLIS: Particularly in the 83 1 2 Back River. That's where the biggest 3 change was made. 4 MR. REES: Or don't we know one 5 way or another? I mean, I'm just trying 6 to clarify what I thought the discussion 7 was, and I wasn't certain even what the 8 question was let alone what the answer 9 was. 10 MR. KITCHENS: All right. I can 11 answer that, I think. And I'll put it 12 this way. There was a larger area 13 downstream of Highway 17 that was fresher 14 with the tide gate taken out of operation 15 without harbor deepening having occurred 16 during the time that we were doing work 17 out there in the marsh when the Army 18 Corps was holding the tide gate open for 19 us. 20 This was -- I can't -- I can't 21 tell you what the river flows were. I 22 can't remember. But when I was out 23 gathering salinity data across that 24 floodplain in the airboat, they were 25 certainly lower than they are today. 84 1 2 This is in the Middle River system and 3 the lower Back system below 17. 4 Above 17, it wasn't necessarily 5 the case. That's prior to the deepening 6 that occurred after the tide gate was 7 taken out of operation. 8 Now, the -- that observation may 9 be mitigated by river flow. I can't say 10 for certain, because I would have to look 11 at that. 12 If you look at that slide I put 13 up that had those salinities, they 14 certainly were drastically reduced down 15 to sites below 17. Again, I don't know 16 river flow at that point. 17 But our model was predicated on 18 those salinities that we were looking at 19 at that point in time and gave us every 20 reason to expect the kind of outcome that 21 I showed you. 22 Now, the fact of the matter is, 23 today the salinities in the wells at 24 sites in those areas that I've been 25 referencing right now are higher than I 85 1 2 would expect. And that, I feel, is due 3 in large part to the drought. 4 The vegetation in those sites 5 three years ago gave me -- well, showed 6 promise, showed indication of recovery, a 7 trend toward that fresh mix, the species 8 that are indicative of that fresh mix, 9 even in the Middle and lower -- not lower 10 Middle, but the Middle River system where 11 we feel that salinities are particularly 12 exacerbated by the present deepening. 13 The drought has no doubt had an 14 effect in that part of the system. So 15 there, John, I think for sure the jury is 16 out. 17 That's the best explanation I can 18 give you at this point. It's -- some 19 things we know and some we don't. You 20 know, it's very tough. 21 MR. BERSON: I'm amazed at what 22 you can do. I mean, James Bond doesn't 23 have anything on you guys. It's 24 amazing. And plus the water moccasin 25 factor is pretty high in my book too. 86 1 2 You get big bonuses for that. 3 MR. KITCHENS: Sean Connery is 4 going to live a lot longer than we do. 5 MR. DYSART: Any further 6 questions? 7 Let me just say, we're getting 8 ready to take a brief break. I want to 9 say two things. One is: I think that 10 this first presentation has been a very 11 good one. We expect the second one will 12 be too. And I think that my sense is 13 that this is the sort of thing that 14 people are very interested in and we're 15 very appreciative of people bringing back 16 science and sharing it with the full 17 membership of the SEG. And I sense a 18 great deal of appreciation and interest 19 all around the table. 20 Before we take a break, I want to 21 go around the table and anybody who has 22 not introduced yourself so far this 23 morning, please give your name and who 24 you are representing, please. 25 Starting up at that end of the 87 1 2 table, who has come in since we 3 introduced? 4 MR. BROWNELL: Press Brownell, 5 National Marine Fishery Service. 6 MR. KYLER: David Kyler, Center 7 for a Sustainable Coast. 8 MR. McCURRY: James McCurry, 9 Georgia Ports Authority. 10 MR. LIAKAKIS: Pete Liakakis, 11 Vice-Chairman of Savannah City Council. 12 MR. DYSART: Welcome, sir. 13 MR. HANZALIK: James Hanzalik, 14 U.S. Coast Guard Marine Safety Office. 15 MR. DYSART: Jon, did you have 16 anything that you wanted to add in 17 closure on you-all's presentation? 18 MR. BOSSART: No, I think we're 19 all wrapped up here. If there are a few 20 more questions, we would be glad to 21 entertain them. 22 MR. DYSART: I would say the real 23 secret for outstanding science is the 24 quality of the graduate students and the 25 technicians who are actually doing the 88 1 2 work. From my academic experience, I 3 know the real secret there. 4 I declare a Stakeholders 5 Evaluation Group consensus on the value 6 of graduate students and technicians in 7 making principals look good. 8 Five-minute break. Thank you. 9 (Short break) 10 MR. DYSART: We'll reconvene the 11 group now. And our next major 12 presentation, Ted Will is going to be 13 briefing us on the results of the 14 University of Georgia striped bass 15 report. I'm sure lots of people have 16 been looking forward to this. And we saw 17 some little fish before and we hope we 18 get to see some great big fish this 19 time. 20 Ted, you take off for the next 21 hour or so. 22 MR. WILL: First of all, you 23 know, I am working for the Georgia 24 Department of Natural Resources now, but 25 in 1999 and 2000, I was working for 89 1 2 Dr. Cecil Jennings at the University of 3 Georgia as a research coordinator on the 4 striped bass project. So that's kind of 5 why I'm presenting this information to 6 you guys today. 7 And the objective of this talk 8 is, first I want to give you some 9 background. We need to be on that common 10 playing field here before we go into this 11 study that I presented. 12 A little bit of striped bass 13 biology. We talked about the Savannah 14 River striped bass, Savannah River 15 alterations. I'll hit on that briefly, 16 Wiley Kitchens -- Dr. Kitchens did a good 17 job of covering that, then talk about how 18 these alterations were reflective through 19 the population decline, the striped bass 20 population decline both in the adult and 21 egg abundances, and then look at our 22 restoration efforts so far with the 23 habitat and stock enhancement. And then, 24 you know, once we are there, then we can 25 see how the study fits into the process, 90 1 2 this restoration process and then go 3 through that study. 4 So first, striped bass, you know, 5 they are pretty long-lived. Live 6 approximately 20 years. Big fish. 7 Modern world record around 78 pounds. 8 The males mature at a much 9 younger age than females, usually age two 10 or three, females around five or six. So 11 the females grow longer for a longer 12 period of time before they reach that 13 maturity level. 14 And they are anadromous -- 15 generally anadromous species. They spawn 16 in open waters generally in the Savannah 17 River and estuarine systems down here in 18 the sandy flats, high current areas. 19 They just broadcast their eggs into the 20 water column and they float down the 21 water channels. 22 And they are highly fecund. By 23 "fecundity," I'm talking about the 24 number of eggs in an individual female 25 striped bass. They are highly fecund. 91 1 2 And stocks, you know, they are found from 3 Nova Scotia to Florida, the Gulf, out in 4 the Pacific and of course in reservoirs 5 that have been stocked. 6 They are an economically 7 important species. I don't know if you 8 guys are aware of it, but fishing is big 9 business in Georgia. A study by the U.S. 10 Fish & Wildlife Service and Bureau Census 11 reported that there is almost one million 12 anglers 16 years or older in Georgia that 13 contribute $1.1 billion in expenses to 14 Georgia's economy in 1996. 15 And of these anglers, 197,000 -- 16 approximately 197,000 spent, that fished 17 for the Morone species, striped bass, 18 striped bass hybrids, white bass, spent 19 approximately $131 million in 1996. 20 So you can see why Georgia 21 Department of Natural Resources is 22 interested in enhancing these resources, 23 preserving them and promoting, you know, 24 striped bass fishery resources. 25 And specifically within the 92 1 2 Savannah River, historically, it was a 3 thriving fishery. Georgia's largest 4 fishery was, you know, the Savannah River 5 Estuary. 6 And probably even more important, 7 it was the source of our brood females 8 where we would go out and collect these 9 big female striped bass, take them back 10 to the hatchery, spawn these fish, stock 11 these fish in our reservoirs and promote 12 fishery across the state based on this 13 stock, unique stock of striped bass in 14 the Savannah River Estuary. 15 I say that it is unique. How is 16 it unique? Well, they're primary 17 riverine. You know, when you think about 18 striped bass stocks up north, they go out 19 to the ocean, they come back. But this 20 species remains in the estuary and the 21 river upstream of the estuary 22 year-round. They're stream dependent, 23 meaning at some point in their life cycle 24 they depend on the estuary and primarily 25 in reproduction and juvenile nursery 93 1 2 habitat. 3 Also they are genetically 4 distinct. So they are a unique species, 5 different than found in other stocks 6 across the United States. 7 Now I'm going to move into the 8 hydraulic alterations briefly. Basically 9 historically we did have upriver dams. I 10 can't, you know, leave out that. That's, 11 you know, huge Savannah bluff is blocking 12 the furthest dam upstream. Also the 13 channel widening and channel deepening 14 that has occurred has probably had some 15 impacts within the estuary. 16 But the two that Dr. Kitchens 17 really hit on well here that were the 18 most emphasis thus far has been put on as 19 far as impacts to the striped bass 20 fishery have been the diversion canal and 21 the tide gate. 22 Basically this is a picture of 23 the tide gate. I'm going to go through 24 this briefly. I know y'all probably 25 understand this by now. 94 1 2 This is a picture of the tide 3 gate on the Back River. Location, you 4 know, down in here. Water was -- you 5 know, on flood tides, the gates were 6 closed, ebb out, down, scour out the 7 Front River channel down through the 8 diversion canal. 9 Now, while the map is up here, I 10 want to point out that this area in the 11 Back River through here is -- that was 12 the historic spawning ground. This is 13 where they went out and they collected 14 these big females and this is where 15 before this tide gate was put in we said, 16 "Hey, there might be some impacts here." 17 So we did monitor -- do some monitoring 18 studies with striped bass egg 19 abundances. And the majority of striped 20 bass eggs, 90 percent, something like 21 that, were collected in these Back River 22 areas right here. So this is -- you 23 know, this was the money spot for striped 24 bass. 25 So knowing that, let's see what 95 1 2 we saw when the tide gate was put in. 3 You know, of course the salinities, as 4 already mentioned, increased in the Back 5 River area. Conversion of, you know, I 6 don't know how -- how good this estimate 7 is, but this is one that I -- we dug out 8 of one of the -- I think Dr. Kitchen's 9 publications. But conversion of 74 10 percent of freshwater marsh to brackish. 11 The big thing was the elevated 12 salinities in historic spawning grounds. 13 And that diversion canal really 14 accelerated the transportation of these 15 eggs into areas of lethal salinities. 16 So now that we understand some of 17 the alterations that have occurred, let's 18 see, you know, what we were seeing over 19 the years while we were monitoring the 20 system, both in the adults and the egg 21 abundances. 22 I mentioned monitoring. You 23 know, the typical -- the two things that 24 we have most data on is electrofishing 25 and our standardized -- University of 96 1 2 Georgia's standardized egg sampling 3 data. 4 Let's look at electrofishing 5 first. Keep in mind this is a time when 6 the tide gate, you know, was really 7 kicking -- well, just starting off. And 8 I will run out to we -- until the time 9 period when we said, "Hey, we need to do 10 something." So this is when restoration 11 efforts pretty much started kicking in in 12 here. 13 So we can see that Catch Per Unit 14 Effort -- that's CPUE -- Catch Per Unit 15 Effort of all fish two years and older 16 decreased dramatically. And along those 17 same lines, Catch Per Unit Effort of 18 these large 20-pound nine kilogram 19 fish -- this fish is probably 17, 18 20 pounds, would be my guess -- Catch Per 21 Unit Effort of these fish fell off 22 drastically as well. 23 So at this point we're going, 24 "Hey, you know, there is a problem. 25 We're not able to go out and collect 97 1 2 these big brood females." And then, you 3 know, University of Georgia egg data also 4 indicated, "Hey, yeah, you know, we're 5 not seeing the spawning that used to 6 occur in these areas." 7 So now that we've established 8 that, hey, there is a problem, you know, 9 what can we do? Well, the first thing we 10 did was stopped all fishing. You know, 11 no more removal of fish. Established a 12 fishing moratorium, Georgia did in 1988 13 and South Carolina in 1990. Now let's 14 try to help this population out a little 15 bit. Let's start putting fish in there, 16 see if we can reestablish this 17 population. 18 So we started stocking fish from, 19 you know, these stockings came from 20 actually the reservoirs that we stocked 21 from the brood female. So we kept the 22 genetics in line. 23 And then, you know, cessation of 24 the tide gate. You know, we need to stop 25 the tide gate from operating. And 98 1 2 striped bass research went in to, you 3 know, removal of tide gate from 4 operation, as well as all the tidal 5 freshwater and things like that. So also 6 the filling in of the diversion canal. 7 So now let's see where we are at 8 now. You know, you look at this, you go, 9 "Whoa, we are back." But it's important 10 for you guys to understand here two 11 things about this graph: One is that 12 these numbers of age two-plus fish are 13 probably a little bit smaller than they 14 should be. You know, they were out in 15 these days looking for big brood females 16 and they probably didn't record all of 17 the smaller fish. You know, some of 18 those fish may have been passed up. 19 The second thing that's important 20 to note here, is these are stocked fish. 21 All of these fish are natural 22 recruitment. All of these fish, or I 23 would say 80 to 90 percent of them, were 24 Georgia DNR stocked fish. And this is 25 not natural recruitment. This is just a 99 1 2 great stocking success thus far. 3 And if you look at Catch Per Unit 4 of these large 20-pound fish, you know, 5 again these are -- you know, majority of 6 these fish right here making a comeback, 7 we're getting that little increase in 8 these large fish, but they are still, you 9 know, stocked fish. 10 So, you know, how can we really 11 see how that fits in? Also another -- 12 well, I want to say this. Another 13 important thing to look at here is we're 14 seeing this increase in the number of 15 large fish, but yet we're not seeing that 16 big increase in egg numbers. 17 Now, again, I want to point out 18 here that 90 percent of these, you know, 19 high egg densities that were reported 20 were in the Back River. These egg 21 densities here, 90 percent of these are 22 Front River. You know, nothing is really 23 occurring in that Back River. Everything 24 we are collecting is coming from the 25 Front River. 100 1 2 So that's kind of where we are at 3 now as far as the data. 4 Now, what are some of the new 5 directions that have been taken? Well, 6 first, you know, I don't know if you are 7 familiar with the Corps of Engineers 1135 8 Restoration Team, but they asked ATM to 9 examine conditions given that, you know, 10 no spawning is taking place in that Back 11 River. Hey, what happened? How can we 12 look back and see, you know, what the 13 conditions were in the past? 14 So they were asked to examine 15 conditions historically compared to 16 present conditions. And many of these 17 data are purported changes in tidal force 18 of the freshwater inflow. This is still 19 preliminary stuff. We haven't received a 20 finalized report. Velocity and salinity 21 conditions. Historic versus present. 22 And bathymetric and geometric changes. 23 And already from even the 24 preliminary reports, some good 25 information can be gleaned from this 101 1 2 study, specifically in the changes in 3 tidal forces and velocity conditions 4 within the Back River, it seems like we 5 can pin down some velocity issues in the 6 Back River. 7 Also, the Corps of Engineers 8 funded us in 1999 to do some additional 9 studies. You know, up to this point all 10 we've had is electrofishing data and the 11 egg sampling data. But people started to 12 question, you know, "Hey, we're seeing 13 these numbers of big fish increase, why 14 are we not seeing this increase in egg 15 abundance?" 16 So they said, "Well, you know, 17 are these fish, are they developing 18 properly or is the maturation of the 19 fecundity levels, is the number of eggs 20 where they need to be?" Are these fish 21 getting the job done, in other words. 22 So in 1999, UGA evaluated 23 fecundity of these fish and maturity of 24 the oocytes or eggs using ultrasonic 25 imaging. We also continued monitoring 102 1 2 the spatial and temporal egg 3 distributions, egg sampling, egg density 4 data. 5 And at last minute, you know, 6 this new idea of using egg surrogates 7 kind of came in in 1999, almost, in 8 February, early February. So we decided 9 to use striped bass egg surrogates to 10 look at what these numbers really mean 11 with our -- all these past egg densities 12 that had been collected throughout the 13 years, what do they mean as far as eggs 14 at large? You know, what is the 15 relationship when we collect an egg in 16 that nest, what does that mean as far as 17 the total number of eggs out in the 18 estuary? So that was a new pilot study 19 that was put in in 1999. 20 And data from that pilot study 21 kind of indicated some things that, you 22 know, we hadn't really hit on before. 23 Mainly that Front River was more 24 important than -- probably more important 25 than previously thought. 103 1 2 Egg -- for a given egg or egg 3 surrogate, you would collect more -- or I 4 should say the Front River was a wider 5 and deeper channel than the Back River. 6 The Back River is shallow and narrow. So 7 given number of eggs, you would collect 8 more in the Back River than the Front 9 River. So our detection threshold in the 10 Front River was much less than the Back 11 River. 12 Also, we released -- you know, 13 I'll show this a little bit later on, but 14 we released a lot of eggs up here in the 15 Front River and they distributed all 16 through the channel. So even eggs 17 spawned in the Front River could be 18 distributed back through the Back and 19 Middle Rivers. 20 So this was, you know, kind of 21 the driving force for this additional 22 year, this 2000. You know, this is why 23 we were bringing this out, "Hey, this is 24 a pilot study, preliminary, we need to go 25 further with this." 104 1 2 So that leads us, you know, 3 from -- Georgia Ports, you know, 4 gratefully funded this research for us so 5 we could further investigate this and 6 some other things. 7 So our objectives in 2000 were to 8 again evaluate the existing fecundity 9 model and look at temporal changes in 10 maturity and fecundity from 1999 to 11 2000. Again, do our standardized egg 12 sampling protocol. 13 We've had this continuation of a 14 long data set, which is real important 15 over the years to get that data set, you 16 know, monitor those trends. And also, 17 probably the most important thing, was to 18 validate the egg detection threshold data 19 from these standardized egg sampling 20 procedures and getting an estimate of 21 total egg production, which has really 22 never been done before with striped bass 23 successfully. 24 So now I'll talk about the 25 fecundity and maturation, give you an 105 1 2 idea of what's involved there. 3 To know the number of eggs within 4 a female striped bass, you first must 5 know the ovary volume, and then you have 6 to know what the ovary is composed of. 7 For ovary volume we used 8 ultrasonic imaging. It's non-evasive. 9 We didn't have to sacrifice a lot of 10 large brood female. 11 For ovary composition we used a 12 small catheter, basically a syringe with 13 plastic tube, withdrew a one millimeter 14 sample from the ovary and enumerated 15 those eggs or oocytes -- I'll use that 16 interchangeably, eggs or oocytes, same 17 thing -- and staged those eggs. 18 So let's look first, let me show 19 you what the ultrasonic imaging 20 involved. Basically I followed the guys 21 around electrofishing. They'd hand me 22 these big females in the boat and I would 23 have the ultrasound machine right in the 24 boat. I could scan the fish, record 25 those images. I had a recording device 106 1 2 within the boat. And I could make 3 measurements on the boat or I could take 4 the recorded images back to the lab and 5 make measurements of the ovary there. 6 This is a picture from 1999 when 7 we were using a linear ray probe as 8 compared -- for those of you guys who 9 have children, you probably are aware of 10 what a curved ray probe might look like 11 on an ultrasound machine because that's 12 what the doctor used. And that's what we 13 used in 2000, because we found that the 14 linear ray probe could not capture the 15 entire ovaries of these big female 16 striped bass. 17 But anyway, let's look at what 18 these ultrasonic images of the ovaries 19 would look like. If you look here, the 20 way this ultra -- the way this probe is 21 positioned on the fish is what you are 22 seeing up here. This is the ventral or 23 the bottom side of the fish. This is the 24 dorsal or top half of the fish. And 25 these are the two ovaries right here. 107 1 2 And these -- this is what we are looking 3 at. This is one, of course, we had to 4 sacrifice. We had to do this to 5 validate, you know, what we were looking 6 at. And of course for image -- for 7 modeling purposes we had to actually 8 measure the known ovary volume and 9 compare that to what we were predicting 10 with the ultrasound machine. 11 And these are just reflections 12 through the air bladder that reflects 13 through anything that's air, ultrasound 14 does. You can see the air bladder right 15 there at my index finger. 16 Anyway, we used the curved ray 17 probe, I wanted to point that out, in 18 2000. It captured more of the ovary in 19 these larger fish. 20 We found that all we needed to 21 measure using the ultrasound was the five 22 cross-sectional areas. We take five 23 measurements of the area, take the mean 24 of that and that's what we used in the 25 model to predict ovary volumes. We 108 1 2 looked at total length, maximum ovary 3 areas and a few other things, but this is 4 what we needed. 5 Now I'll talk about -- now that 6 we understand how we got the ovary 7 volume, how did -- you know, what about 8 the enumeration and staging? Let's look 9 at that real briefly. 10 Basically a lot of lab work. 11 Like I said, take a sample of the 12 catheter, known one millimeter sample. 13 Enumerate, count each little bitty egg. 14 Take those eggs, put them on a slide, 15 they were dissected. Then we bring them 16 back and we can stage a representative 17 sample from that slide of the oocytes. 18 And don't get confused by this, 19 but I just want to tell you -- you know, 20 show you that eggs have a developmental 21 sequence from young baby eggs to adult 22 ready-to-get-spawned eggs. 23 And basically the primary oocytes 24 or primary eggs are the youngest. They 25 remain in the striped bass ovary 109 1 2 year-round. But as these little blue -- 3 these are the little blue ones, the 4 primary. As they begin to develop, they 5 of course enlarge and you see lipids, 6 little white droplets of lipids forming 7 the periphery around the center germinal 8 vessel. So it moves from primary to 9 secondary. And then it moves into a 10 mature oocyte, vitellogenic. And 11 basically you can tell that just by the 12 dark blue vitellogenic that forms around 13 these lipids. 14 And this is the indication, hey, 15 this fish is mature, it can develop 16 oocytes that could be released for 17 spawning and, you know, fertilization. 18 So vitellogenic is kind of the maturity 19 indicator. 20 And then as the egg is spawning, 21 river temperatures start getting right, 22 water levels, whatever the indicator is 23 that needs to push this development 24 further, these lipids start -- the oocyte 25 swells, you know, gets larger, the lipids 110 1 2 start to coalesce, push in this germinal 3 vesicle out towards the periphery and 4 then final oocyte maturity and the egg 5 that's ready to get spawned and the 6 lipids have fully coalesced, germinal 7 vesicle to the center. You know, this is 8 what the hatchery people call sunny side 9 up. This baby is ready to be released. 10 And you can tell -- these eggs 11 only remain in the fish, you know, 12 to 12 24 hours. So that's -- these fish are 13 ready to spawn. 14 And I also wanted to put in here 15 atretic oocytes. Atretic oocytes are 16 dead oocytes. Basically you get a lot of 17 internal deterioration within the 18 oocyte. Everything breaks down and these 19 oocytes just deteriorate and basically 20 get reabsorbed back into the ovarian 21 mass. And where we saw this primarily 22 was in smaller fish that were developed 23 from these primary beginning eggs to the 24 secondary, but they wouldn't quite make 25 vitellogenic and they just deteriorate 111 1 2 and get reabsorbed probably back into the 3 ovarian mass. 4 Anyway, this is some numbers from 5 the results of 1999 and 2000. We used 31 6 females in 1999. We did have to 7 sacrifice these fish for image 8 verification and statistical modelling 9 purposes. And 22 of 31 fish we used 10 fecundity estimates. Similar thing in 11 2000. 12 This is the model -- simple 13 progression model based on the log of the 14 actual measured ovary volume from the 15 sacrificed fish versus the log of the 16 mean of the five cross-sectional areas 17 from the ultrasound machine. So then we 18 could develop that simple progression 19 model and apply it to all the other 20 ultrasonic image measurements of the fish 21 and then bring in the enumeration data 22 from where we sat there and counted each 23 little egg from that one millimeter 24 sample and developed fecundity 25 estimates. 112 1 2 And these 1999 and 2000 estimates 3 are shown here. And you can see that 4 fecundity was fine as compared to Roanoke 5 River. Rulifson and Lewis and Bonner 6 were the closest estimates within the 7 Atlantic Coast that I could find good 8 fecundity estimates along the same lines 9 of what we'd done for striped bass. And 10 we were right there with them, if not a 11 little bit higher. 12 And also you can see in 2000 that 13 we were able to actually produce 14 fecundity estimates for these larger 15 females, which, you know, that's good 16 information. Plus we were able to with 17 that curved ray probe get the accurate 18 measurements of ovary volume. 19 Now, maturity. Okay. The 20 fecundity levels are there, so what about 21 maturity? Are the oocytes maturing 22 properly? 23 So, again, just think of this 24 primary oocytes to final oocytes ready to 25 be released within 12 to 24 hours, fish 113 1 2 are ready to spawn. As a maturity scale, 3 we can see that oocytes were developing, 4 eggs were developing properly within 5 these females. And we found very few 6 atretic oocytes within the fish. And 7 these were found in smaller females, like 8 I mentioned previously. 9 And finding these in the final 10 stages of maturity was a good point to 11 bring out, because these fish were likely 12 within the habitats where they were going 13 to spawn, given that these eggs were 14 ready to be released. 15 If you look at stage values, 16 again, little baby egg, mature egg ready 17 to be released. You can see that as the 18 fish -- these larger fish, fish greater 19 than say 750 millimeters in length, 20 generally all of their eggs were 21 vitello -- mature and developing to the 22 final stages. And these smaller fish, we 23 saw some immature eggs and there is 24 question of whether they were maturing. 25 So now let's -- we also were out 114 1 2 there collecting eggs within the estuary 3 looking on a temporal basis. And 4 basically when we saw these eggs maturing 5 to the final stages ready to be released, 6 we actually were collecting them with our 7 gear. So another indication that there 8 is no problem with fish spawning in the 9 Savannah River Estuary, at least stocked 10 fish. 11 So fecundity levels are 12 comparable. The eggs were maturing 13 properly. And is the habitat suitable 14 for spawning? Well, it certainly seems 15 suitable for, you know, the maturity and 16 release of these oocytes. Everything was 17 maturing properly, so this question has 18 now been resolved. 19 So what now? Well, it looks 20 like, you know, just based on this 21 information we were saying, looks like 22 time for these smaller female striped 23 bass to grow to sizes, you know, the big 24 mamas that produce the millions of eggs. 25 So this gal can produce a lot towards 115 1 2 that total production number as compared 3 to the previous fish. 4 So now let's talk about briefly 5 the standardized egg sampling. Again, we 6 went out and did our standardized egg 7 sampling in 2000. Basically within that 8 we have ten stations in the Savannah 9 River Estuary, five distributed along the 10 Front River, one in the Middle River and 11 four distributed along the Back River. 12 We sample five stations a day. We sample 13 every day of the week. And, you know, 14 we -- spawning season runs from March to 15 May. 16 In year 2000 there was an 17 increase, you know. We're starting to 18 increase -- see the increase in the 19 number of large females. We believe 20 we're starting to see that within our egg 21 density collections. 22 So egg densities did appear to 23 increase in 2000. Of course when you 24 step back and look at that compared to 25 historical numbers, you go, "Man, you 116 1 2 know, we're still not there." But still, 3 no eggs, you know, very few eggs are 4 collected proportionally in the Back 5 River. You know, of the 923 eggs 6 collected, 93 percent of those eggs were 7 collected in this Front River area, 8 primarily right here. And this Back 9 River area probably just got a little 10 trickle down from the Front River fish 11 spawn, more than likely. 12 So that was the standardized egg 13 sampling. Now, the thing we were really 14 after was validating what these egg 15 densities mean. What do those numbers 16 really mean as far as eggs at large and 17 try to get an estimated total egg 18 production. 19 The striped bass egg surrogates 20 that we're using kind of came from a 21 drink developed by Clearly Canadian 22 called Orbits. I don't know if any of 23 you have had the pleasure or probably 24 displeasure of having this drink, but 25 they had these little gel beads within 117 1 2 the drink. And somebody saw those one 3 day and said, "Hey, they look like 4 striped bass eggs." Did the research and 5 found the company that developed 6 50-gallon barrels of these beads. 7 So that's what we were using as 8 egg surrogates. Each one of these 9 barrels have their own unique color and 10 flavors. You've got your yellow or 11 lemon, grape or purple, and the reddish 12 are orange-flavored beads. 13 So we took these 50-gallon 14 barrels, we did some measurements and the 15 size is similar to that of striped bass 16 eggs and the specific gravity was similar 17 to that of striped bass eggs. Specific 18 gravity of striped bass eggs are slightly 19 greater than that of water and so are 20 these guys. 21 So then we went out with these 22 barrels of beads and we wanted the best 23 way we could just to simulate a striped 24 bass spawning event. We went to historic 25 spawning areas and spawned. This is me 118 1 2 spawning. And there is these beads 3 released in the water. 4 So now it's important -- also we 5 didn't change anything in our sampling 6 protocol. We used the same sampling -- 7 exact same thing we would do on any other 8 day. We didn't change anything 9 different. So we're trying to really 10 get, you know, what would we be 11 collecting over the years represented 12 through that sampling procedure. 13 First, I want to bring out 1999, 14 because this kind of gave us the four 15 questions to lead into 2000 studies. 16 In 1999, the first time we went 17 out, we released approximately 18 1.1 million of these beads above I-95 in 19 the Savannah River. And the following 20 day we collected four of these beads 21 right around, you know, this location. 22 These are in river miles, the SR, 23 Savannah River, 26. Whatever. But these 24 are in river miles. 25 On that same day that we were 119 1 2 collecting for those purple beads, we 3 released an additional 2.1 million at the 4 same location. And given the historic 5 importance of the Back River, we wanted 6 to investigate that. We released 7 approximately 1.8 million red beads back 8 there. 9 The next day of sampling we did 10 not collect any more purple beads in the 11 Front River, but we collected yellow 12 beads in both the Front, Middle and Back 13 River. And of the red beads we collected 14 eight of those only at one Back River 15 station. 16 And the last day of sampling -- I 17 want to point out that these beads 18 generally -- well, striped bass eggs last 19 approximately 48 hours before they 20 hatch. So that's the reason for the 21 two-day sampling interval for each color 22 bead. 23 So the last day of sampling, we 24 did not collect any more eggs in the 25 Front River, but we even collected more 120 1 2 of both the yellow and red in the Middle 3 and Back Rivers, 33 percent more red 4 beads than the previous day. 5 So this information was new and 6 kind of exciting for us. This is why we 7 wanted to continue this type of research, 8 to see if we can further our knowledge of 9 not only, you know, present data 10 collections, but historic data 11 collections. 12 And this led into, you know, the 13 thoughts of the Savannah River, you know, 14 historically we're thinking Back River, 15 Back River. But, you know, this thing 16 really is an estuary and it should be 17 considered as a whole system, not try to 18 partition out different river issues. 19 Also, the general -- from that 20 data, looking at this system as a whole, 21 one egg collected pretty much in our egg 22 sample gear represented 200,000 eggs at 23 large, which meant if this fish spawned 24 in 1999, one small female would have 25 spawned, we would have collected an egg. 121 1 2 So that information in itself was useful 3 in just trying to, you know, ascertain 4 what those egg densities meant to us when 5 we were out there collecting these 6 samples. 7 So in spring 2000, we want to 8 replicate our methods, look at some 9 density dependence relationships, you 10 know, the number at large, does it change 11 and also further our knowledge in the 12 distribution pathways. These things can 13 really get strange out there in the 14 Savannah -- through all those channels. 15 The way these eggs distribute is wild 16 stuff sometimes. 17 So basically the more eggs that 18 we release -- we went back to the same 19 site, so I'm not going to show you all of 20 the -- everything we did, but just kind 21 of give you a taste of it. But we went 22 out to the same sites, released higher 23 densities and basically just caught 24 proportionally more eggs. The higher 25 density, the higher number of eggs we 122 1 2 would collect. Detection thresholds 3 generally remained the same. Went to 4 areas such as Union Creek where a large 5 number of large brood females or big 6 females were collected during 1999 and 7 2000 and released beads there. 8 And again, even releasing beads 9 up here in Union Creek, you know, beads 10 were distributed through all three 11 channels. And, you know, we released 12 over -- we also changed our collection 13 times a little bit. In one instance we 14 wanted to go out and release -- this area 15 too on the Savannah River was also right 16 above it was we also collected a lot of 17 large brood females. So we're really 18 trying to use that in conjunction of 19 where we were collecting big females and 20 try to look at present egg densities and 21 what that means to us. 22 But anyway, we released on a high 23 ebb and went out at different collection 24 times to see how that would change our 25 detection threshold. And it would 123 1 2 change. And probably worse case scenario 3 out there, this would be our detection, 4 one egg equals one -- you know, 5 hundreds -- one million eggs at large. 6 And that's probably the worse case 7 scenario that we could imagine. If you 8 want to just go out there and not try to 9 capture eggs that you've released, that 10 would be the worse case scenario. 11 Then of course in the Back River 12 we were doing some of the same things. 13 We released under low flood conditions -- 14 low flood and same densities, changed our 15 sampling time a little bit and also 16 released under different, you know, high 17 ebbs. And, you know, the detection 18 thresholds did change, but yet you can 19 see that, you know, one egg equals 69,000 20 is certainly different than one egg 21 equalling approximately 200,000 within 22 the Front River. 23 So what does all this mean? 24 Well, just basically to sum it up, you 25 know, these were the detection thresholds 124 1 2 that were found in 2000. And we can take 3 that number, go back to our egg densities 4 from our standardized egg sampling, 5 number of eggs that we collected, and use 6 that to estimate total egg production. 7 So we estimated there to be about 8 141 million eggs in the Savannah River 9 Estuary in year 2000. And we also went 10 back and did use '99 data to estimate 11 those. So you can see that there was 12 almost a fourfold increase in egg 13 abundance, total egg production in 2000 14 as compared to 1999. And also this 141 15 million eggs may represent anywhere from 16 150 to probably 250 mature female striped 17 bass. 18 So what now? Well, we certainly 19 are looking at this system as a whole. 20 You know, the Front River may be more 21 important than previously thought. We've 22 been talking about Back River issues 23 primarily over all the past years, but 24 now we're looking into the Front River 25 further. And the idea of -- this is just 125 1 2 within the striped bass community. The 3 idea of pulling together all of this 4 historical data and synthesizing this 5 information to a document that would 6 serve to document our present knowledge 7 of the fishery, you know, the avenues in 8 which researchers have taken in the past 9 to restore this population and also maybe 10 to strengthen avenues that we were going 11 to take within the future and why we're 12 taking those directions and see if we've 13 missed anything, also. This information 14 would help us look back and see if we've 15 missed something in the past. 16 We've also, within the ATM's 17 report, we think we've hit on, you know, 18 some velocity issues in the Back River, 19 that the velocities just aren't quite 20 right. And we're really looking forward 21 to that report becoming final. There is 22 some additional information that can be 23 gleaned from that report with some 24 different number crunching. So we're 25 really looking forward to that. 126 1 2 And also we're -- 1999 and 2000 3 were low flow years. So understanding 4 what's going on, all of these egg 5 detection thresholds, egg densities, how 6 things are distributed throughout the 7 estuary will likely change under normal 8 flows or high flows. So there is also, 9 you know, the thought out there of 10 further conducting some research 11 obtaining additional knowledge under 12 normal flow conditions. 13 And with that, I'll leave early 14 today. 15 MR. DYSART: Before we start 16 having questions, we've had a couple of 17 folks come in and join us. Would you all 18 introduce yourself, your name and 19 affiliation for the record, please? 20 MR. TOLLISON: Sam Drake, 21 retired. 22 MR. DRAKE: Tripp Tollison. I'm 23 not sure where I'm at. 24 MR. TOLLISON: I'm Tripp Tollison 25 with the Savannah Chamber. 127 1 2 MR. DRAKE: Sam Drake, just South 3 Carolina citizen. 4 MR. DYSART: Anybody else slip 5 in? Welcome. Two very distinguished 6 people join the group. 7 How about questions for Ted? 8 Thank you for a very nice 9 presentation. 10 Question? Comments? 11 Allan. 12 MR. FLOCK: Did you also look at 13 recruitment from the current brood stock 14 that's in there? Are those eggs making 15 it to -- 16 MR. WILL: We have not got at 17 that level yet. We are still waiting for 18 that -- you know, we feel that under 19 normal flow conditions, that these big 20 brood females may start spawning within 21 the Back River. We hope that's going to 22 be the case anyway. 23 And then, you know, if we can get 24 those fish in the Back River, we believe 25 the nursery habitat and recruitment in 128 1 2 the Back River will be much higher than 3 in the Front River. 4 So we're hoping that we can get 5 the fish back there spawning again. But 6 if we can't, then we have to kind of drop 7 back and look at, you know, this is what 8 we have now, let's go with that. 9 MR. DYSART: Will? 10 MR. BERSON: I'm pretty sure I 11 misinterpreted this, but I want to ask 12 the question. 13 Based on the number of eggs that 14 you have been finding, could it be that 15 there are as few as 250 mature females in 16 the system? I mean, that -- 17 MR. WILL: That's correct. 18 MR. BERSON: Okay. That's kind 19 of alarming. 20 MR. WILL: Yeah, that's -- but it 21 could be as many as -- I mean, even 22 our -- I'm conducting some population, 23 brief population studies, mark recapture 24 studies out there. And just looking at 25 that data, haven't fully went through it 129 1 2 yet, but, you know, somewhere probably 3 within the 600 to 800 fish range, 4 females. So total population is not that 5 large. 6 MR. DYSART: Press? 7 MR. BROWNELL: Is there anyone 8 doing telemetry work right now with these 9 larger striped bass? 10 MR. WILL: No telemetry work 11 right now. You know, that's another 12 point that these large -- you know, there 13 is a population within the estuary right 14 now, and they're primarily young fish. 15 And these bigger fish need to go further 16 upstream and find probably some cool 17 water refuge during the summer months. 18 Telemetry work has been done in 19 the past by a band enable at the 20 University of Georgia and indicated 21 movements of these big females up in the 22 Savannah bluff, in that area. 23 MR. DYSART: Charles, Jamie, John 24 and Priscilla. 25 MR. SUTLIVE: Do you have any 130 1 2 similar activities or studies in the 3 Ogeechee River in Bryan County? That 4 seems like a natural habitat for striped 5 bass. 6 MR. WILL: We have not conducted 7 any egg studies, but we're out there each 8 year doing the same standardized 9 electrofishing program that we're 10 conducting in the Savannah River. And we 11 have data on that population as well. 12 MR. SUTLIVE: Any comparisons in 13 terms of mortality? 14 MR. WILL: We found that, you 15 know, from the Ogeechee River, it's kind 16 of -- it's a little bit different of a 17 system than the Savannah River, but we 18 did find -- you know, and we haven't 19 really applied this, but recruitment 20 under low flow years in the Ogeechee 21 River was real low. 22 Under low flow and high flow 23 years, you have very low recruitment in 24 the population. And that's kind of, you 25 know, a shame for the Savannah River if 131 1 2 that's also the same indication, meaning 3 in 1999/2000, those large adults that 4 were spawning, maybe -- you know, that 5 natural recruitment we will not see 6 anything there. But that's the only 7 additional data that I guess from the 8 Ogeechee River that we could kind of use 9 towards Savannah River. 10 MR. SUTLIVE: Thank you. 11 MR. McCURRY: When you look at 12 the population increase over the last 13 five years, the primary difference there 14 is just that the tide gate is no longer 15 active; is that right? You haven't 16 been -- 17 MR. WILL: No, that's stocking. 18 MR. McCURRY: I know it's 19 stocking, but you are not stocking any 20 more fish per year -- 21 MR. WILL: Yeah. 22 MR. McCURRY: You are? 23 MR. WILL: Yeah. We're stocking 24 40,000 fish, about like that, a year. 25 MR. McCURRY: Have you been 132 1 2 stocking just -- has it been a consistent 3 stock number over the -- 4 MR. WILL: Since 1990, we started 5 our stocking efforts, but we really 6 optimized that study again by the 7 University of Georgia looking at, you 8 know, what sizes of fish to stock to find 9 that optimization between survival and 10 economics. That report was in 1994/1995 11 which shifted to stocking the Phase II 12 larger fish in November. 13 But since that time, we've 14 stocked approximately 40,000 fish from 15 '95 to the last six years, 40,000 fish 16 within that estuary, these smaller fish. 17 That's what we're seeing within the 18 data. I don't know, am I missing -- 19 MR. McCURRY: Just making sure 20 the same amount of fish were being 21 stocked per year so you see that 22 sustainability? 23 MR. WILL: Right. We've got to 24 pay attention to that through natural 25 recruitment, because we monitored natural 133 1 2 recruitment. If we are putting more fish 3 out there one year and then we come back 4 and try to figure out -- when I say how 5 we're looking at natural recruitment in 6 this population, every one of those fish 7 that we stock, we immerse them in a 8 chemical when they are little babies and 9 it puts a mark on their -- just call it 10 an ear bone, little otolith. And that 11 mark, so each year we can go back and 12 take a sub-sample of these fish, age two 13 fish is what we're sampling, forty or so 14 fish, we take a sample of those, we pull 15 the otolith, they dissect them and they 16 look for these marks. 17 So it's important we be 18 consistent and know what we are putting 19 in there just when we are looking at fish 20 that have that mark and fish that don't 21 have the mark. And that's how we're 22 looking at natural recruitment over the 23 years, which is something I didn't bring 24 out. 25 MR. McCURRY: The sustainability 134 1 2 of the habitat there is greater now. I 3 mean, there has been improvement in the 4 habitat since the tide gate has been 5 removed? 6 MR. WILL: We don't know. We 7 just know that stocking works. That's 8 all that we know right now. We haven't 9 seen any indications of natural 10 recruitment thus far. 11 MR. DYSART: John. 12 MR. ROBINETTE: Ted, with your 13 estimates of what each egg represents in 14 total numbers and that kind of stuff, can 15 you go back and look at what was done 16 previously before the tide gate came into 17 operation and get an estimate of what 18 that system had as far as total number of 19 eggs released and total number of mature 20 females? 21 MR. WILL: Well, we can -- you 22 know, there is two things with this that 23 we have to address. The first thing is, 24 you know, sampling protocol. You know, 25 the nets that we use and, you know, 135 1 2 probably the way that we fish these 3 methods within the channel have changed 4 some since Dudley Black compared to, you 5 know, Dr. Jennings. You know, they have 6 their own little methods. 7 But generally they are sampling 8 the same proportion of the water column. 9 So I think we can get around that. 10 However, what we can't get around 11 is the low flows. You know, we get these 12 egg densities under low flows, channels 13 have changed, little distribution 14 pathways have changed a little bit. And 15 also, you know, we probably need, you 16 know, two points so that we could see how 17 our densities change over different 18 flows. 19 So there are some things to 20 address. I think we could get back to 21 that and see what those numbers really 22 meant for total weight production at 23 large in the Back River historically. 24 And it's an area that we're looking at 25 going towards. I mean, this has been 136 1 2 brought to the floor. 3 And also, you know, trying to 4 look at, you know, maybe modeling, seeing 5 if we can model some of these beads. And 6 this is all stuff that we're kind of 7 kicking around the Striped Bass Committee 8 right now. And, you know, as soon as we 9 determine what direction we need to go 10 in, we'll bring it to you guys. 11 MR. ROBINETTE: The other thing I 12 wanted to ask was the eggs that are 13 released in the Front River as opposed to 14 the eggs that are either released in the 15 Back River or end up in the Back River, 16 do you think there -- just from your 17 knowledge, I know you probably don't have 18 any data on this, do you think there 19 would be a difference in the survival? 20 MR. WILL: Well, we feel that 21 eggs need to be in the Back River for -- 22 right now that's, you know, that's when 23 we know it was working. When fish were 24 spawning in the Back River, we were 25 seeing natural recruitment. 137 1 2 Fish are spawning now in the 3 Front River and we're still not seeing, 4 you know, a lot of natural recruitment. 5 So, you know, we feel that we need to get 6 fish spawning again in the Back River. 7 We're certainly trying to do that. 8 MR. DYSART: Priscilla was next. 9 MS. WENDT: Maybe this is a 10 trivial question, but I thought it was 11 remarkable how few beads you actually 12 collected after distributing so many. Do 13 you attribute that strictly to the fact 14 that they are so widely distributed 15 throughout the system and your sampling 16 method is so relatively inefficient or is 17 something happening to some of them, some 18 proportion of them in the interim? 19 MR. WILL: I thought it was -- on 20 the contrary, I thought it was amazing 21 that we collected one of these beads. 22 When you are out there -- I mean, 23 I'm telling you, the first time we 24 released these things, I mean, you are 25 out on a large river. I mean, and you 138 1 2 release these beads and next thing you 3 know, they are just drifting around for 4 24 hours in this huge estuarine system. 5 And to think you can go out with a little 6 net like this on the front of your boat 7 and trolling in the channel for 30 8 minutes and collect one? It blew my mind 9 that we can -- you know, actually, I 10 think our gear was certainly more 11 efficient than I would have ever 12 believed. 13 Now I don't know what your 14 question was. 15 MS. WENDT: I was asking aside 16 from the relative inefficiency, I mean, 17 compared to what you have out there, 18 whether there is any indication that 19 something is happening to the beads or to 20 eggs in the interim? Are they being 21 eaten, preyed upon? 22 MR. WILL: We don't think so. 23 They are sugary. I mean, I don't know if 24 any fish species love little sugary 25 pellets coming down through the water 139 1 2 column, but we are assuming that they 3 distribute naturally throughout the water 4 column just as the striped bass egg. We 5 assume normal distribution of eggs 6 drifting through that both with striped 7 bass eggs and with those beads. 8 MR. HALL: Perhaps the water 9 expands and takes in the (inaudible) as 10 the striped bass. It's amazing. 11 MR. HANZALIK: Now, you're saying 12 that you want the bass to spawn in the 13 Back River but they are spawning in the 14 Front River. Why are they spawning in 15 the Front River instead of the Back 16 River? 17 MR. WILL: They've always spawned 18 in the Front River. Historically, you 19 know, we've always been collecting those 20 egg numbers in the Front River. 21 However, you know, it's when they 22 were spawning in the Back River is when 23 we were, you know, showing all of the 24 good, natural -- these age two-plus fish, 25 big fish were, you know, recruiting up. 140 1 2 So we knew that spawning in the Back 3 River worked. So, you know, naturally we 4 would want to try to go back to get that 5 spawning occurring in the Back River 6 again. 7 MR. HANZALIK: Has there been any 8 studies done to say when these fish 9 typically spawn at a certain time, 10 certain temperature of water, certain 11 salinity and all that other stuff so the 12 conditions have to be exactly right to 13 spawn in the area? 14 MR. WILL: There is -- and that's 15 what I was getting at. Just from ATM's 16 preliminary report have indicated 17 velocities may have changed in the Back 18 River. And that's why -- just now, keep 19 in mind folks, that over 1999 and 2000 20 was really the first years that we were 21 seeing these big females again. 22 So we're right at the brink of, 23 you know, restoring this population. We 24 think that with normal flows, that 25 velocity conditions may be appropriate in 141 1 2 the Back River. We don't know. 3 So these are things that we have 4 to look at. We're right at the verge. 5 The decline in the population was 10 to 6 12 years, so certainly the restoration in 7 the population restoring -- you know, 8 these fish grow for many years, 20 9 years. So restoring this population is 10 going to be, you know, a timely thing 11 too. 12 But we think we're right there. 13 We're getting the big fish. We need some 14 normal flows and see what's going on then 15 and I think we really can have a better 16 handle on the situation. 17 MR. DYSART: Judy Jennings. 18 MS. JENNINGS: Again, it's 19 technical. An oocyte, that's a 20 fertilized egg? 21 MR. WILL: Yes. Well, no. 22 MS. JENNINGS: No? 23 MR. WILL: No. They are not -- I 24 don't think they are used in -- well, 25 maybe it is, to be honest, Judy. I don't 142 1 2 think it is. But from the literature 3 that I read, it was just from all their 4 reports, they were just samples taken, 5 withdrawn from the female, fixed on a 6 slide and they called these oocytes. 7 MS. JENNINGS: Is fertilization 8 internal or external? 9 MR. WILL: Fertilization would 10 be -- is not internal. They release 11 their eggs. The males come out, bunch of 12 sperm and it all mixes up in the water 13 column. 14 MS. JENNINGS: My thinking here 15 is you've established that you have eggs, 16 but you've also established that you 17 don't get little fish. So I'm saying, 18 that's what you are looking for is what 19 is missing? 20 MR. WILL: Right. 21 MS. JENNINGS: So I guess I was 22 just looking for the other half. 23 MR. WILL: But the missing link 24 there was fish at the hatchery. We 25 actually did take fish from the Savannah 143 1 2 River, fertilize the eggs, spawned them, 3 and good results. 4 I mean, the missing link there 5 has been filled. So we do have the data 6 there to fill that. And it's a good 7 question. Great question. But we've 8 covered that one. 9 MR. DYSART: Will and then 10 Charlie. 11 MR. BERSON: I just want to know, 12 do you go fishing on the weekends for 13 fun? 14 MR. WILL: Weekends? Weekdays. 15 Yeah, I mean, that's, yeah, one of our -- 16 well, we -- 17 MR. BERSON: I mean on your day 18 off. 19 MR. WILL: Yes, I -- we do. And 20 we collect -- we've really figured out 21 the striped bass. And it's a tremendous 22 fishery right now. We really hope to 23 reestablish this thing. 24 MR. DYSART: With options like 25 electrofishing gear and dynamite, he does 144 1 2 well. 3 MR. MOORE: I'm just curious, do 4 you have a feel for the spawning 5 population and the stocking? In other 6 words, is what you are seeing a 7 proportion of them are stocked fish? 8 MR. WILL: Eighty to ninety 9 percent are stocked fish. 10 MR. MOORE: So they are 11 spawning? 12 MR. WILL: Eighty to ninety 13 percent are fish that we have put into 14 the river. Ten -- ten to twenty percent 15 are fish that have naturally recruited 16 within that population, fish that were 17 spawned, fertilized and grew up within 18 the estuary. Those are the numbers that 19 we have right now. 20 MR. MOORE: So when you are 21 electrofishing and you catch fish, ninety 22 percent of them are stocked fish? 23 MR. WILL: Yes, pretty much. 24 MR. DYSART: Further questions? 25 MR. FLOCK: I'm assuming you use 145 1 2 the same genetic strain to plow back 3 in -- 4 MR. WILL: The fish that we took 5 out, spawned, stocked in reservoirs went 6 back to the reservoirs, grabbed our fish 7 back, put them back in. 8 MR. DYSART: Further questions? 9 Joe. 10 MR. HIETT: I think I saw on one 11 of the slides that the eggs were 12 migrating from the lower -- from the Back 13 and Middle River to the Front River. Was 14 there any migration the other way? 15 MR. WILL: Yeah, eggs moved 16 from -- eggs released in the Front River 17 distributed in the Middle or Back River. 18 But generally eggs that we released in 19 the Back River only had one chance and 20 that's -- why can't I think of it, Carl, 21 the cut there? 22 MR. HALL: Rifle Cut. 23 MR. WILL: Rifle cut. You know, 24 the chance -- but they do go through 25 Rifle Cut. 146 1 2 MR. MOORE: They die back up 3 the -- 4 THE WITNESS: Yeah, the tides 5 that we were releasing those, it would be 6 hard for those eggs to drift back up and 7 shift the ways back down. But, no, we 8 did not find the beads released in the 9 Back River, generally all were collected 10 in the Back River. 11 MR. HALL: In answer to several 12 questions. From a salinity standpoint, 13 certainly we're in a lot better shape in 14 the Back River than we are in the Front 15 River. We established the striped bass 16 spawning back there and we think the 17 changes in velocity is a major key. 18 Those fish are not electing to release 19 those eggs under certain velocities. 20 With enough additional work and 21 modeling, we may be able to answer those 22 questions with some indications that the 23 Front River is flooding much sooner 24 upstream and changing the hydrologic 25 regime than when it was possibly before 147 1 2 the last deepening. We have to look 3 further into that. 4 So we are concerned depending on 5 where the lethal salt line is on the 6 Front River and certain other factors, 7 you know, the final disposition of the 8 eggs now potentially in the future were 9 fish that were spawned in the Front 10 River. 11 Those are the big -- we would 12 like to reestablish you might say the 13 degree of spawning in the Back River that 14 we had historically before the tide 15 gate. And we're not sure if we can do 16 that. 17 MR. DYSART: Okay. I don't see 18 any more cards up. 19 MR. MOORE: I have a quick 20 question. How many years have y'all been 21 restocking or stocking? 22 MR. WILL: We started in 1990, 23 but probably -- and I always say this, 24 but, you know, really optimized that 25 stocking program in 1995. So, eleven 148 1 2 years, Carl? Is that -- 3 MR. HALL: Yeah. 4 MR. MOORE: And still 20 percent 5 of what you-all get -- are grabbing are 6 stocked fish? 7 MR. WILL: It takes, you know, 8 seven years, eight years, maybe ten years 9 to get these big females. And that's not 10 even a big female. 11 You know, we're looking, you 12 know, the decline was gradual over time. 13 You know, those big females still existed 14 when all these impacts took place. So 15 they were still contributing through the 16 years. But all of the sudden they 17 started dying off and that's when we 18 really saw the egg numbers drop. 19 We can't expect anything more 20 when we start stocking to take that much 21 time to build the population back up to 22 those levels. 23 MR. HALL: The large females were 24 continuing to spawn after the population 25 went few. Okay. And the eggs were not 149 1 2 surviving due to the hydrological 3 conditions at that time in the river and 4 eventually just died out in '87, '88, it 5 just hit, it was a precipitous decline. 6 Hit rock bottom. 7 MR. DYSART: I think there has 8 been two fine presentations. Is there 9 anybody sitting around the table who has 10 not participated in the discussion who 11 has any kind of observation or comment or 12 reaction to the science presentation 13 you've heard this morning? 14 I would -- one of my great goals 15 in life is to have one of these meetings 16 were everybody gets an opportunity and 17 avails themselves of the opportunity to 18 expressing themselves. That's kind of 19 what a group like this is about. 20 Does anybody have any kind of 21 reaction or thought, or gee whiz or it 22 was wonderful or, you know, any kind of 23 reaction? 24 Anybody who hasn't said anything 25 that would like to say something, share a 150 1 2 feeling or view with us? 3 Let the record show that 4 everybody had a chance to speak today. 5 Okay. 6 The next thing I think we've got 7 is our -- going to be moving fairly fast 8 here -- committee reports. 9 Chris -- first is the Aquifer 10 Impacts. And Chris asked me to read a 11 very brief paragraph into the record. 12 Quote: The Aquifer Committee has 13 not met since the last SEG meeting, at 14 which time a formal progress report on 15 the status of the inquiry into the 16 Florida Dam Aquifer had been presented by 17 John Cox. 18 The working group is scheduled to 19 meet again July 24th and 25th. The 20 Aquifer Committee will meet thereafter, 21 probably the second or third Friday in 22 August. As information develops, it will 23 be posted on the Aquifer Committee web 24 page. End quote. 25 Since I can't stand questions on 151 1 2 that, let's move to the next one. 3 Beach Erosion. Bill Farmer has 4 gone off to Maine and is having a good 5 time and he has asked Larry Keegan to 6 provide a report to the SEG. 7 MR. KEEGAN: Bill is actually in 8 Vermont, I think. 9 MR. DYSART: Excuse me, I stand 10 corrected. 11 MR. KEEGAN: One of those places 12 in New England. 13 Really nothing to report. The 14 committee has not met. The beach erosion 15 study should be entering the release 16 stage later this month. And that's it. 17 MR. DYSART: Okay. Seeing no 18 questions, Dredging and Disposal. Fred 19 Beason, any activity in that committee? 20 Hearing no comments, move on. 21 Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, 22 Bill and/or Chris. 23 MR. BAILEY: We have not met 24 since the last SEG meeting. We probably 25 will have a meeting next month or so. 152 1 2 MR. DYSART: MTRG. Bo? 3 MR. ELLIS: Passing around a 4 status report. Everybody get a copy? 5 It's eight pages. And as typical, it 6 doesn't include all of the attachments. 7 The attachments have been distributed to 8 the MTRG electronically and were pretty 9 large. I didn't attach them to this. 10 But this does give you a good summary of 11 the discussion from an earlier meeting on 12 April 24th. 13 If you have all of the -- if you 14 have the report, I'll just go through it 15 quickly. The purpose of the April 24 16 meeting was to primarily look at the 17 calibration -- the status of the 18 calibration work for the hydrodynamic and 19 salinity model. 20 Previously to this meeting there 21 had been a draft hydrodynamic age and 22 sampling model calibration report 23 released. The MTRG spent a couple of 24 months reviewing that report, submitted 25 some comments and at this meeting we went 153 1 2 through all of the comments and then 3 talked about a further course of action 4 to finalize the model calibration, the 5 hydrodynamic and salinity model 6 calibration. And that was the purpose of 7 the meeting. 8 You see the attendees. 9 A note at the middle -- in the 10 middle of Page 1 under General Opening 11 Comments that all of the comments that 12 had come in from the MTRG members had 13 been compiled and distributed earlier 14 than the meeting via E-mail and everybody 15 had a chance to review the comments 16 before the meeting. And so part of the 17 meeting was spent in trying to resolve 18 the comments, agree on a course of action 19 in dealing with each comment. 20 Quickly, just to skip through 21 this report and give you a sense of where 22 things are. If you look on Page 2 and 23 Number 2 toward the top, a quick update 24 on the Hydrodynamic Model Draft Report 25 and where we are now. 154 1 2 We completed the 1999 3 calibration, completed validation runs to 4 look at comparisons to the '97 data set, 5 completed the convergence and sigma tests 6 that had been requested and had delivered 7 the draft report. 8 The MTRG reviewed that report, 9 submitted comments and those comments 10 were reviewed at this meeting. If you 11 flip over to Page 3, at the bottom of 12 Page 3 this gives you a very quick 13 summary of where we stand on a lot of the 14 modeling issues. 15 The most difficult issue to 16 resolve is in probably most of the 17 concerns and work of the MTRG has been 18 centered on capturing salinity, the range 19 of salinities that we see up in the 20 estuary. It goes from zero to up to 21 eight, nine parts per thousand very, very 22 quickly and over the tidal cycle. 23 In just reporting the status of 24 where we stand, comparing the data with 25 the model, the large neap salinity 155 1 2 events, we recorded two in the 1999 data 3 set, were reproduced carrying it through 4 the harbor system and into the estuary. 5 The trends and the magnitudes 6 followed the data, the observations, with 7 some distribution differences. The Front 8 and Back River gradients compare well 9 with some distribution differences. 10 Salt flux good down at 11 Ft. Jackson down further in the harbor 12 before it branches to the Front and Back 13 Rivers, not as good up at Port Wentworth 14 and the three river split. 15 One thing we're interested in is 16 looking at the Hoolahan Bridge at the 17 Front River, Middle River and Back River 18 and see what kind of salinity 19 distribution in those three branches of 20 the river are and we did a good split of 21 the salt flux at those three branches. 22 As far as percentile analysis of 23 all of the model to data comparison, the 24 means -- the means salinities are being 25 well represented throughout the system, 156 1 2 and especially up in the estuary. 3 The predicted range. The range 4 of salinities, especially in the estuary, 5 are smaller than the observed. Basically 6 the computer model tends to smooth the 7 data and you don't capture all of the 8 dynamics of the system. So we're falling 9 short of capturing the peak and the 10 bottom. 11 The predicted 90th percentile 12 salinities are lower in the model than 13 the observed data. 14 The bottom salinities are being 15 represented better than the surface 16 salinities. And that's a function of the 17 vertical mixing and either stratification 18 and de-stratification of the system. 19 And the Front River is being 20 captured better than the Back River. 21 Flipping back to the back, 22 Page 7, this is the summary of the 23 discussion that followed in reviewing all 24 of the comments that were submitted by 25 the MTRG. Each comment was -- was 157 1 2 reviewed and discussed. And I just want 3 to point out that these are bulleted and 4 summarized and I won't go into any of the 5 comments in particular, but just point 6 out that they were gone over and we did 7 come up with a course of action that was 8 discussed. 9 After the meeting there was a 10 talk about what do we need to do to get 11 an acceptable model and to prioritize the 12 improvements that had been recommended in 13 the comments. And on Page 8, if you look 14 under the heading List of Model 15 Improvement Priorities, we summarize some 16 of the priorities that were discussed 17 during the MTRG meeting. 18 And if you look down at the 19 subheading Model Improvement Priorities, 20 one of the improvements that were 21 recommended by the MTRG was to improve 22 the 90th percentile salinity prediction 23 in the Middle and Back Rivers, to improve 24 the temperature model calibration, 25 particularly upstream -- upstream of 158 1 2 I-95, and that will become important in 3 the dissolved oxygen model, improve the 4 tidal response and the mean surface 5 elevation at GPA-14 -- that's I-95 -- and 6 then improve the current predictions at 7 GPA-04, which is down here, Ft. Jackson, 8 in the middle of the harbor area. 9 And then there were some 10 recommended approaches to try to improve 11 the model to achieve these priorities. 12 At the time in April, we did 13 think that we could get together and 14 regroup on June 14th and we did set a 15 tentative meeting date at that time. In 16 looking at the status of the work and the 17 improvements we needed to go back before 18 we met again and report back to the MTRG, 19 it was decided not to have that meeting. 20 It looks like we're going to probably be 21 meeting sometime in the middle of August 22 to discuss these new improvements on the 23 salinity and hydrodynamic model. 24 That's a very quick summary of 25 the meeting and the status of the 159 1 2 modeling work. But if you have any 3 questions, I'll be glad to answer those. 4 MR. DYSART: Comments or 5 questions for Bo? Thank you. 6 MR. ELLIS: All right. 7 MR. DYSART: Moving on, I guess 8 we can relieve Ted Will of having a 9 report here. We've had a wonderful 10 report already. Thank you, unless there 11 is anything else you want to tell us. 12 MR. WILL: I've got a handout, 13 but it's on the web site too. The 14 information is there, except there is a 15 misspelling on it. I'll send that to 16 Larry for an update. It's all there on 17 the web. 18 MR. DYSART: Okay. Appreciate 19 that. 20 Communications. Ben Brewton. 21 Anybody else from the Communications 22 Committee got any indication of activity 23 or -- 24 MR. REES: No activity. 25 MR. DYSART: Okay. Economics 160 1 2 Working Group. Judy. 3 MS. JENNINGS: Yeah, we met 4 yesterday. And primary topics are white 5 papers that we had previously agreed to 6 do and continuing the discussion of 7 evaluation of natural resources. 8 We had asked agencies for input 9 on our objective as we had stated it. 10 And I was really pleased yesterday to 11 have Russell Webb and Ted Will sweetly 12 sat through our entire meeting. 13 Next time -- there was some 14 conversation about doing a giant meeting 15 to do all of the white papers at once, 16 but we'll meet again on July the 21st to 17 finish the trade protection white paper 18 and the fleet protection white paper and 19 then after that we'll probably group them 20 together. 21 If I could personally recognize 22 Ally Rees, who works for Morgan and who 23 has done a tremendous amount of work 24 putting together the white papers. She's 25 been real useful and helpful. 161 1 2 In the end, I thought it was 3 really interesting, is we went through 4 the trade projections white paper, we 5 actually I think on at least two 6 occasions disagreed with original 7 assumptions and agreed among ourselves to 8 disagree. And then there was a good deal 9 of -- there was some requests for 10 additional information and we identified 11 some sources for that additional 12 information. 13 Morgan? Ally? Anybody else who 14 was there, what can we add? 15 MR. REES: Nothing to add. 16 MS. JENNINGS: Again, I continue 17 to encourage participation. 18 MR. DYSART: Thank you. Does 19 anybody have any comments or questions? 20 There is obviously lots of interesting 21 things being discussed within the 22 Economics Working Group and we appreciate 23 Ally doing all of the work there for 24 Morgan and making him look good, just 25 like graduate students and biotechs do 162 1 2 for faculty people. I know that from 3 personal knowledge. 4 Okay. Thank you very much, 5 Judy. 6 Operating Guidelines. Teri 7 Leffek. 8 MS. LEFFEK: We have not met 9 since our last meeting. However, at that 10 last meeting there was some discussion 11 about the issue of peer review. And 12 Morgan has kindly followed up on that and 13 hopefully within sometime this week I'll 14 have something going out to the committee 15 to review that issue and follow up and 16 sort of close that loophole. But we have 17 not met since our last meeting. 18 MR. DYSART: Okay. Thank you. 19 I don't see any new business on 20 the agenda, unless anybody wants to put 21 anything on there. 22 So about a year and a half ago we 23 were told to -- we were supposed to be 24 preparing an agenda here. If you will 25 trust your fellow members to advise me of 163 1 2 anything that they need, we'll put it on 3 the agenda. 4 And as usual, if there are any 5 suggestions, either here during the 6 meeting or immediately after, let me know 7 and it will be on there, because the 8 agenda is made up by input from the 9 members. 10 Next Meeting Date. What is your 11 pleasure? Want to meet in a month, two 12 months, three months or whatever? Do we 13 have a recommendation from the 14 membership? 15 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: September. 16 MR. DYSART: Okay. September the 17 11th would be the first Tuesday after 18 Labor Day that does not conflict with 19 Labor Day. How does September the 11th 20 sound? 21 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Terrific. 22 MR. DYSART: We have a 23 Stakeholders Evaluation Group consensus 24 declared on that. 25 Nine to noon okay on that or go 164 1 2 on much longer? 3 Consensus on half a day. 4 Location. We've got the location 5 here, Cathy? Thank you. 6 I think we're ready to wind up. 7 And I personally appreciate, as your 8 facilitator, appreciate the wonderful 9 presentations we had today. It is 10 evident that there is considerable 11 activity going on within the working 12 committees, and that is evident in the 13 presentations. 14 I think that when you have as 15 much good stuff packed into a meeting as 16 this, we can all feel pretty good that 17 we're running just a little bit over. 18 Even Will has behaved himself today. And 19 it's been very productive and I hope that 20 we have a meeting as good as this next 21 time. I appreciate you all being here. 22 Does anybody have any comment 23 before we close? 24 Will? 25 MR. GRABILL: Just one comment. 165 1 2 I appreciate Sam dropping by, our retired 3 refuge manager. At our next meeting we 4 should have our new refuge manager here, 5 Donny Browning, who worked for several 6 years in South Carolina in the Ace Basin 7 area. He's in New Mexico now, but he 8 should be here for our September meeting. 9 MR. DYSART: I would clarify 10 something. We were talking about Tripp 11 and Sam coming in and I said a couple of 12 distinguished people. I clarify that to 13 say that Sam is doubly distinguished and 14 that's where the two distinguished people 15 came from. 16 We are glad to have Sam here and 17 hope you will continue to be with us. 18 And Tripp and his new life, we appreciate 19 you continuing your active interest in 20 the SEG also. 21 MR. TOLLISON: I appreciate your 22 kind words. 23 MR. DYSART: If there is nothing 24 else, we will declare the meeting 25 adjourned. Thank you very much. 166 1 2 C E R T I F I C A T E 3 4 G E O R G I A : 5 CHATHAM COUNTY: 6 7 I hereby certify that the foregoing 8 transcript was taken down, as stated in 9 the caption, and was reduced to 10 typewriting under my direction, and that 11 the foregoing represents a true and 12 correct transcript of the hearing. 13 This, the 12th day of July, 2001. 14 15 16 _________________________ 17 Linda Tate, Certified Court Reporter, B-2182 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25