Sarah Gardiner

Tyndall Research Theme: Cities and Coasts
Duration of your PhD: 2008/2011
Thesis's Supervisor: Prof R J Nicholls
My Thesis' Abstract: Saltmarshes have historically declined in the UK. They are important as areas for coastal wildlife and fisheries as well as providing coastal protection via wave dissipation. This PhD is investigating estuary morphodynamics with relation to accretional and erosional trends at estuary and sub-estuary scale using Poole Harbour as a case study site.
Poole Harbour has experienced a net decline in saltmarshes since at least 1947. Work to date has shown that saltmarsh erosion is more complex than previously thought, suggesting many drivers are important including hydrodynamics and wave action. In addition, some saltmarsh accretion has occurred within creek systems, where the shoreward tide is strongest (flood dominant). Sub-estuary variations in tidal dominance appear to be an important control on saltmarsh trends.
These insights provide significant information to better predict future saltmarsh trends and how future changes in Poole Harbour (and other South coast estuaries) may change in the coming decades.

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