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Nutrient Mass Flux Between Florida Bay and the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary

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Nutrient Mass Flux Between Florida Bay and the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary Estuaries and Coasts: J CERF (2008) 31:21–32 DOI 10.1007/s12237-007-9032-5 Nutrient Mass Flux between Florida Bay and the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary Patrick J. Gibson & Joseph N. Boyer & Ned P. Smith Received: 26 April 2007 /Revised: 15 August 2007 /Accepted: 15 August 2007 /Published online: 9 January 2008 # Coastal and Estuarine Research Federation 2007 Abstract There is a net discharge of water and nutrients small compared to the average tidal exchange. Nutrient through Long Key Channel from Florida Bay to the Florida loading of relatively enriched bay waters is mediated by tidal Keys National Marine Sanctuary (FKNMS). There has been exchange and mixing with more ambient concentrations of speculation that this water and its constituents may be the western Florida Bay and Hawk Channel. System-wide contributing to the loss of coral cover on the Florida Keys budgets indicate that the contribution of Florida Bay waters Reef tract over the past few decades, as well as speculation to the inorganic nitrogen pool of the Keys coral reef is small that changes in freshwater flow in the upstream Everglades relative to offshore inputs. ecosystem associated with the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan may exacerbate this phenomenon. The Keywords Florida Bay. Florida Keys . Nutrients . results of this study indicate that although there is a net export Nutrient loading . Volume transport . Nitrogen . Phosphorus of approximately 3,850 (±404) ton N year−1 and 63 (±7) ton Pyear−1, the concentrations of these nutrients flowing out of Florida Bay are the same as those flowing in. This implies Introduction that no significant nutrient enrichment is occurring in the waters of the FKNMS in the vicinity of Long Key Channel. Nutrient loading to coastal ecosystems has resulted in Because of the effect of restricted southwestward water flow profound shifts in system structure and function in a variety through Florida Bay by shallow banks and small islands, the of environments (Nixon 1995; Vitousek et al. 1997). These volume of relatively high-nutrient water from central and altered states generally have decreased ecosystem function eastern portions of the bay exiting through the channel is in terms of nutrient cycling and provision of habitat. This is especially true for the coral reef areas of the Florida Keys. Many reports blame anthropogenic nutrient loading for the P. J. Gibson : J. N. Boyer (*) decline in coral biomass and health (Gardner et al. 2003). Southeast Environmental Research Center, One hypothesis is that nutrient export from Florida Bay Florida International University, through the tidal passes of the Florida Keys is delivering OE-148, Miami, FL 33199, USA extraneous nutrient loads to the Florida Keys reef tract, e-mail: [email protected] resulting in dramatic declines in coral biomass and health N. P. Smith (Porter et al. 1999, 2002). Although these shifts have Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute, undoubtedly occurred over the last few decades, little 5600 US 1 North, evidence has been provided to identify Florida Bay waters Ft. Pierce, FL 34946, USA as the culprit (Lapointe and Clark 1992). Present address: South Florida’s marine ecosystem is highly connected by P. J. Gibson regional circulation patterns that fluctuate over seasonal Department of Marine Sciences, cycles according to wind forcing (Lee et al. 2002). University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 340 Chapman Hall CB no. 3300, Throughout the year, shelf waters, including discharge Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3300, USA from the Everglades, are directed southeastward along the 22 Estuaries and Coasts: J CERF (2008) 31:21–32 southwest Florida coast and enter Florida Bay through the water transport processes of the area through the construc- central and northern parts of the open western boundary. tion of canals, levees, water control structures, and Water leaves the bay through the southern part of the wastewater management practices. As the Everglades are western boundary and especially through tidal channels in entering an era of ecosystem rehabilitation as part of the the Middle Keys, where it may then be advected toward the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan, close atten- reef tract (Fig. 1). tion must be paid to the downstream effects of restoration The islands of the Florida Keys extend southwest from efforts with special attention of water flow, quality, and Miami and mainland Florida in a shallow arc that nutrient loading. terminates at Key West. The archipelago serves as a Nutrient exchange between Florida Bay and its adjacent perforated boundary between two distinct, nationally ecosystems varies as a function of flow and concentration. protected ecosystems: Florida Bay (as part of Everglades Resultant concentrations in the bay are a factor of input National Park) and the Florida Keys National Marine from upstream systems of the Everglades and the Gulf of Sanctuary (FKNMS). Florida Bay estuary is a dynamic Mexico, atmospheric and groundwater inputs, wastewater region of exchange for three distinct hydrological systems and storm water delivery from the developed islands of the of South Florida: the freshwater Everglades to the north, the Florida Keys, and the biogeochemical transformations Southwest Florida Shelf and the Gulf of Mexico to the occurring within the bay itself. Flows to and from adjacent west, and the coastal Atlantic and Florida Keys reef tract to systems are driven by geomorphology, tidal forcing, wind the south and east (Fig. 1). Changes in the hydrologic stress, and the influence of regional mesoscale behavior of regime and water quality parameters of source waters may the Loop and Florida Currents (Lee et al. 2002). The tidal have direct or indirect effects on the ecologically sensitive passes of the Keys island chain serve as a connection downstream systems of Florida Bay and the reef tract between waters from Florida Bay, the Southwest Florida (Lapointe and Barile 2004). Shelf, and the Gulf of Mexico with the waters of the Rapid development of both the mainland and island Atlantic coastal environment. Previous studies of the communities of South Florida has drastically altered natural physical processes of South Florida have revealed persistent Fig. 1 Map of Florida Bay and 81º00’W 80º45’W 80º30’W 80º15’W the Florida Keys depicting Long Key Channel study area. The bay is divided into three zones: west, central, and east, based on multivariate analysis of water quality characteristics and driv- ing forces after Boyer et al. 25º15’N 25º00’N 24º45’N (1997). Station 244 of the Water Quality Monitoring Network is represented as a diamond in the Long Key Channel area C WE 81º05’W Long Key Hawk Channel Channel eef Tract Florida Keys R 0126 km Moser Channel Estuaries and Coasts: J CERF (2008) 31:21–32 23 residual transport through the passes of the Middle Keys in the Keys island chain other than Moser Channel of the toward the Atlantic (Lee and Smith 2002; Smith and Lee Seven Mile Bridge. Moser Channel lies west of the 81°05′ 2003). W meridian, the operational western boundary of Florida Although large-scale nutrient budgets for total nitrogen Bay, and is beyond the scope of this study. (TN) and total phosphorus (TP) for Florida Bay have been The monitoring station for this study was established proposed (Rudnick et al. 1999; Cerco et al. 2000; Boyer approximately mid-channel, bay side of the Long Key and Keller 2007), nutrient mass exchange through the Viaduct Bridge at 24°47.857′N and 80°52.225′W, which Keys’ tidal passes has never been measured directly. The corresponded with previous Long Key Channel studies best estimates were based upon nutrient concentration data (Smith 1998). Long Key Channel is approximately 3767 m with monthly or quarterly intervals applied to hourly flow across, has an average depth of 2.85 m, and is oriented measurements (Boyer and Keller 2007), and the resulting along a roughly 160/340° heading. The channel bottom is budgets are largely unbalanced and have admitted uncer- composed of limestone hardbottom spotted with solution tainties in the material flux estimates to and from the holes, soft corals, a few sponges, and scattered small hard estuary. These prior attempts at estimating nutrient transport corals. A few shallow banks are present in the channel across the boundaries of FloridaBayvaryinboth giving the bottom varying topography. The tidal signal of magnitude and direction of net mass flux. Long Key Channel is complex because of the influence of The purpose of this study was to directly quantify the mixed semidiurnal tides of the eastern Gulf of Mexico exchange of water and nutrients through one of the largest interacting out of phase with the semidiurnal tides of the pass in the Keys, Long Key Channel, using long-term, southern Atlantic (Fig. 2). Transport through the channels is high-resolution, mass flow measurements combined with further complicated by the influence of local wind forcing periodic tidal-scale observations of nutrient concentrations. (Smith 2002). The resulting loads are compared to published values of other regional nutrient fluxes and used to revise the present Instrumentation state of knowledge of nutrient dynamics of the Florida Bay and Florida Keys marine ecosystems. Three instruments were positioned on site, deployed, and serviced at varying intervals. A SonTek Argonaut acoustic Doppler current meter was deployed for three extended Materials and Methods time periods: April 9 to July 16, 2003, August 27, 2003 to May 28, 2004, and July 17 to November 18, 2004. For each Study Location sampling period, current velocity (cm s−1) was measured and averaged for a period of 120 s every hour, along with Long Key Channel is located on the southwest end of Long measurements of pressure and temperature. A total of Key and connects the waters of western Florida Bay to 11,721 current meter data points were directly measured for Hawk Channel.
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