The HaloEd Project

A web site dedicated to biotechnology education

Notes from the Field Trip to Fort McHenry Wetland 10/17/05

This wetland area is a result of dredging for the Fort McHenry tunnel. The National Aquarium took over the mitigation work and developed the area into a functional wetland, monitoring it, removing invasives such as phragmites and alanthus (tree of heaven) as well as periodically bringing in volunteers to remove trash. Some native plants are being added to provide improved habitat for birds.

A solar powered weather monitoring station has been installed, and bird boxes and gourds for purple martins have been made available.(how do the gourds keep out the European starlings and house sparrows, which are both invasive?)

The debris problem:

Marine debris harms aquatic organisms in a variety of ways.

Plastic bags and Styrofoam may appear to be food because of the color and the way it floats - choke animals or clog their digestive tract.

How Long Till It's Gone?
cigarette filters - 1-5 years
plastic drink bottle - 450 years
plastic film canister - 20-30 years
plastic bags - 10 -20 years, some are now being made of photodegradable material
disposable diaper - 450 years
foam cup - 50 years

We collected and counted types of debris and the data is sent to the Ocean Conservancy to create a data base that can be used to support work on alternatives to the types of materials collected.

Top 3 environmental problems at the Ft. McHenry site: water pollution, debris and invasive species.

Photos from the trip

What we found in the water:

Besides all of the nasty debris that was pulled up, the following species were found -
Bass - large or small mouth, not sure. Has counter-shading, top is dark, bottom white as camouflage. Has a slime layer to protect against bacteria, be sure your hand is wet to handle.

killifish - we found mostly males.

silversides - extremely common.

crabs - small blue crab and tiny rock crab

pipefish - very thin.

Near the shore is where there should be grass beds for spawning and for young to hide from predators.

The Chesapeake Bay had record "dead zones" this past summer - areas lacking dissolved oxygen. Excessive nutrients flowing into the water leads to excessive algae growth, this blocks light and much algae dies, the decomposers use up oxygen in the decomposition process and reduces dissolved oxygen NOT GOOD!

Data collected:

salinity 9.0ppt
temp. 19.9 degrees C
DO 6.6 mg/L

Halobacterium Sampling

Teams of 2 took samples from either the water or the muck and these samples will be spread on nutrient agar in the lab to attempt to grow some halophiles.

Selected Results