Existing comment:
Coastal Prairie/Brackish Marsh:
There are a variety if wetland habitats found in Georgia's coastal plain, such as brackish marsh, freshwater marsh, salt marsh, riverine swamps, isolated ponds and open water habitats. The brackish marsh occurs in areas where freshwater and saltwater combine. Brackish marsh occurs at the mouths of large rivers such as the Altamaha where large quantities of freshwater from the interior of Georgia mix with the saltwater of the estuary. Daily tidal fluctuations aid in mixing these waters. Tides are a predictable and measurable rise and fall of water, due to the gravitational pull of the moon. Georgia has the greatest fluctuations of tides on the entire East Coast of the U.S.
Brackish marshes are typically vegetated by a continuous cover of black needlerush, giant cordgrass, and giant entgrass. An abundance of wildlife is known to occur in these marshes such as raccoons, swamp rabbits, fiddler crabs, alligators and birds such as clapper rail, white ibis, glossy ibis, soras and marsh wrens. The marshes here at Hofwyl-Broadfield Plantation also have a high concentration of feral pigs which are very destructive to this habitat. |