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HISTORICAL RECONSTRUCTION OF CONTAMINANT AND ECOLOGICAL CONDITIONS IN AN URBAN SETTING
Citation:
Boothman, W S., C Pesch, J S. Latimer, G. L. Chmura, V. Pospelova, AND Z. Spasojevic. HISTORICAL RECONSTRUCTION OF CONTAMINANT AND ECOLOGICAL CONDITIONS IN AN URBAN SETTING. Presented at Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry Annual Meeting, Baltimore, MD, November 11-15, 2001.
Description:
One problem encountered when trying to establish goals for remediation or restoration of contaminated waterways is the determination of appropriate reference conditions. As an alternative to comparison of reference sites with contaminated waterways, historical reconstruction of past ecological conditions from geochemical and fossil records contained in sediment cores from the waterways themselves can provide both a baseline for contaminant and ecological conditions and determination of the level of contamination associated with extent of impact in a system. During the last 350 years, New Bedford Harbor and surroundings have experienced a series of overlapping socioeconomic periods defined by the principal activities and industries within the harbor and its watershed, e.g., agricultural, whaling, textile, and post-textile. Shifts in the harbor's physical, social, and industrial surroundings have left geochemical and ecological imprints preserved in its sedimentary record. We present here the geochemical record of both preindustrial background conditions and subsequent industrialization of the harbor area and demonstrate alterations in ecological conditions through variations in fossil records of dinoflagellate cyst assemblages and diatom production in New Bedford Harbor and a nearby, nonindustrialized harbor. Through examination of the chronological record of anthropogenic alterations in the harbor and concomitant ecological effects, we may assess the extent to which the ecological integrity of the harbor has been affected by human activities.