• System-wide Monitoring Program
  •   Phase 1 (Abiotic)
    • Water Quality
      • Site Selection
      • Hydrographic
      • Nutrients
    • Meteorological
      • Introduction
      • Site Selection
      • Methods
    •   Real Time data
      • CDMO
      • YSI
  •   Phase 2 (Biodiversity)
  •   Phase 3 (Land Use)
  • Fact Sheets
•   Current Projects
  • Ecology of Salt Panne Habitats
  • Winter Ecology of Marshbirds
  • Winter Ecology of Shorebirds
  • Diamondback Terrapin Population Surveys
  • ECSC Partnership
• Past Projects
• Graduate Research Fellowships

System-wide Monitoring Program

---

The National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR) System-wide Monitoring Program (SWMP) was designed to fulfill two major overall goals:

1. to support state-specific non-point pollution control programs by establishing local networks of continuous water quality monitoring stations in representative protected estuarine ecosystems

2. to develop a nation-wide database on baseline environmental conditions in the NERR system of estuaries.

  The specific goal of SWMP is to identify and track short-term variability and long-term changes in the integrity and biodiversity of representative estuarine ecosystems and coastal watersheds for the purpose of contributing to effective national, regional, and site specific coastal zone management.  This comprehensive program consists of three phased components:

1. abiotic factors such as water quality and meteorological monitoring;

2. biodiversity monitoring;

3. land-use planning analysis.

With the initial focus of phase 1, the NERR SWMP will provide data necessary for intra- and inter- site baseline studies, trend analyses, and impact assessment.