| Abstract: |
Several institutions and organizations are moving forward with plans for ecological forecasts of the Chesapeake. Ecological forecasting is dependent of course on accepted, rigorously reviewed algorithms for biological and biogeochemical processes, highly variable and therefore uncertain dynamics. With that uncertainty, it is important in estuarine ecological forecasting that the hydrodynamics of the system be as finely resolved in the model as possible, as horizontal and particularly vertical distributions of temperature and salt must closely approximate observations because those distributions govern estimates of dissolved oxygen through the water column. Stratified bay waters effectively seal the bottom from re-aeration and therefore control dissolved oxygen levels below the pycnocline. If the pycnocline cannot be estimated well, there can be little possibility of estimating bottom DO dynamics and concentrations to match field levels. This is critical to all DO-related processes, such as nutrient fluxes, summer productivity, and distributions of living resources. The importance of these modeled T and S distributions to observations therefore governs the likely successful ecological forecasts for any future program. |
