Releve Virginia Division of Natural Heritage, see http://www.dcr.virginia.gov/natural_heritage/documents/nh_plotform_instructions.pdf
Overall Taxon Cover Values are Automatically Calculated?
no
Plot Quality Fields:
Plot Validation Level
(2) classification plot: sufficient for inclusion in a classification revision
Overall Plot Vegetation Fields:
Field Height
5
m
Field Cover
80
%
Misc Fields:
Observation Narrative
Low interior marsh dominated by Distichlis spicata and Spartina patens and surrounded by somewhat taller but still low Spartina alterniflora. Several patches of Juncus roemerianus occur in vicinity. Plot lies ca. 20 m from fringe of salt scrub along edge of bay. Ca. 7 cm of standing water present at 1:15 PM, but organic matter assumed to constitute 100% of surface substrate. Much of Spartina patens is matted down and floating underwater, and hence it is difficult to determine cover. It may be that the cover of neither species exceeds 50%, but biomass of Spartina is certainly greater. The physiognomy of this vegetation, in which nearly exclusive codominance by these two species characterizes a higher, interior portion of the landscape - is a common feature of mesohaline marshes bordering the Chesapeake Bay. The tidal regime is assumed to be regularly, diurnally tidal, but the influence is likely manifest more as a rising and a falling of the water table than as overland ebb and flow.
-7 - water table
0 - 25 - mucky, wet silt with abundant fine root material
25 - 65+ - well-consolidated silt with very little fibric organic matter; no abrupt horizon transition
65 - ca. 5 cm section of sand in one profile
