RISING TO THE CHALLENGE: SALT MARSH RESILIENCE AT ELKHORN SLOUGH

Dr. Kerstin Wasson of the Elkhorn Slough Reserve will introduce the audience to the dynamics of a critical habitat within estuaries, salt marsh. She will review the values of marshes to wildlife and humans, and explain what salt marshes need to survive. She will examine threats to salt marshes at Elkhorn Slough, and what strategies can be employed to reverse them. She will focus on the vulnerability of salt marshes to sea level rise, and describe recent research and upcoming restoration projects addressing salt marsh resilience to rising waters.

To track estuarine health at Elkhorn Slough, Kerstin oversees the Reserve's long-term monitoring programs. She also conducts short-term estuarine conservation research. The goal of her research is to characterize and prioritize among anthropogenic threats to estuarine ecosystems, and to develop and test restoration strategies that decrease these threats. Current projects focus on plant invasions at the salt marsh-upland ecotone and native oyster restoration. Kerstin also encourages and facilitates research by students and other researchers at Elkhorn Slough, directing attention to key conservation priorities. She synthesizes the results of relevant studies at Elkhorn Slough and other estuarine ecosystems and uses them to inform coastal management. Kerstin received her doctorate from UC Santa Cruz in 1996 and taught at University of Washington and Humboldt State University before coming to work at the Reserve in 2000, but she has been getting stuck in the Slough's mudflats, in search of invertebrates, since 1990.