BIOL 1080 Lecture Notes - Lecture 14: Seagrass, Aerial Root, Spartina
Document Summary
Chapter 12 estuaries: where rivers meet the sea. Fjords: deep valleys cut on the coast as a result of retreating glaciers, ex: coasts of alaska, norway, new zealand, chile. Developments of estuaries: estuaries are best developed in areas where the costal plain is flat and the continental shelf is wide, the opposite is true in areas with steep, narrow continental shelves and coastal plains. Adapting to salinity changes: organisms in the estuaries are normally euryhaline, tolerate a wide range of salinities. Some are osmoregulators: have mechanisms for keeping their internal concentration stable, others are osmoconformers, have internal concentrations that vary with that of their surroundings. Flowering plants in estuaries: expel excess solutes- salt glands in cordgrass (spartina) and mangroves, concentrate solutes in tissues as in pickleweed (salicornia) Water temperature: wide variation, especially at low tide: can be stressful in summer.
