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GROWTH OF THE MARSH ELDER IVA FRUTESCENS IN RELATION TO DURATION OF TIDAL FLOODING
Citation:
Thursby, G B. AND M Abdelrhman. GROWTH OF THE MARSH ELDER IVA FRUTESCENS IN RELATION TO DURATION OF TIDAL FLOODING. ESTUARIES 27(2):217-224, (2004).
Description:
Iva frutescens is a common shrub at the upland fringe of salt marshes throughout the East and Gulf coasts of North America. Its position and relative size are governed largely by the degree of flooding by seawater. Cross sections of older stems (living and standing dead) from salt marshes in Rhode Island and Florida, USA, were examined in order to age stems and estimate their growth rate from cumulative increase in woody tissue. Most of the stems were six years old or less, suggesting that aboveground structures live for only a few years. Stem diameter correlated with growth rate, aboveground biomass, and land elevation above mean sea level. Elevation was used to estimate the percentage of time that plants were flooded. The most robust plants came from sites that were flooded only one to two percent of the time during the growing season.