Abstract
Statistical aspects of estimating net fluxes of nutrients between a salt marsh and a tidal creek on a tidal cycle basis and an annual basis are explored. For individual tidal cycles, the instantaneous flux of a nutrient is written in a constrained linear model as a function of time. The model is rewritten as an unconstrained model, and net flux is shown to be a linear combination of the parameters of the model. Standard linear models techniques can be used to make inferences about net fluxes on a tidal cycle basis. Considering a year as a finite population of tidal cycles, annual net flux can be estimated using a regression estimator. In the case of the flux of dissolved nitrite plus nitrate, the marsh was found to be a statistically significant sink for nitrogen (in this form) from adjacent tidal creeks.
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Spurrier, J.D., Kjerfve, B. Estimating the net flux of nutrients between a salt marsh and a tidal creek. Estuaries 11, 10–14 (1988). https://doi.org/10.2307/1351713
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1351713