Coastal Erosion, Global Sea-Level Rise, and the Loss of Sand Dune Plant Habitats

Abstract

Much of America's coastline is threatened by overdevelopment and coastal erosion, driven by global sea‐level rise, a problem that is attracting the attention of researchers around the world. Although we have now acknowledged the impending risks, little is known about the response of spatially dependent dune plant communities to the loss or restriction of their habitat. In order to study this development, a spatially explicit model of sand dune plant succession on Galveston Island, Texas, was created, using sea‐level rise as the primary mechanism causing local erosion. Simulations of sea‐level rise scenarios developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change demonstrated that beach erosion constrained plants to a narrow area, resulting in a breakdown of the successional process. The loss of late‐succession plants along coastlines, their dependent faunal species, and possible solutions are discussed. This model and example serves as a harbinger of the future for many of the US's sandy beaches and coastal communities.

Distribution of vegetation along environmental gradients on Sable Island, Nova Scotia

“…Ellipses are drawn to approximate locations of the plot groups 1, 2, and 3 from the cluster analysis (Figure 3). organic layer a) communities (Feagin, Sherman & Grant, 2005) and restrict the viable habitat for plant communities to a narrower zone.…”

Ecological Implications of Extreme Events: Footprints of the 2010 Earthquake along the Chilean Coast

“…The appearance of perennial vegetation that can potentially trap wind-blown sand to form hummocks and embryonic dunes, could further transform these coseismically uplifted coastal habitats to provide an important ecotone between intertidal and terrestrial ecosystems that was eliminated by armouring prior to the earthquake. Such coastal strand zones have become increasingly rare on developed coastlines and are threatened by sea level rise [47], [48].…”

The Impact of Physical Disturbance and Increased Sand Burial on Clonal Growth and Spatial Colonization of Sporobolus virginicus in a Coastal Dune System

“…The evidence here of non-independent effect of burial and natural disturbance further highlights the importance of exploring greater in detail interactions between physically-driven changes in dune plants to make advancements in predicting how global change will affect the structure of plant communities and stability of dunes in future [52–54]. Human activities such as trampling by foot and vehicles and beach-cleaning operations that cause rhizome fragmentation and the artificial structures that modify sand transport may also affect dune plants [55,56]. Therefore, in future more attention should be paid to control human frequentation and activities in mobile dune areas in order to minimize the risk of synergic deleterious effects among anthropogenic disturbances and environmental alterations associated with global change on plant populations.…”