title: Studies of a contaminated brackish marsh in the Hackensack Meadowlands of Northeastern New Jersey: benthic communities and metal contamination.
abstract: Cores taken from 16 stations within Eight Day Swamp, a highly contaminated marsh in the Hackensack Meadowlands, were analyzed for metal concentrations and for benthic community structure. Metal levels were compared with the benchmark ERM values, and expressed in terms of toxic units. Mercury was the most important metal in all the samples in terms of its contribution to the total toxic units. The overall abundance and taxa richness in the benthic community were associated with the height of the location relative to the tidal cycle, but were generally not significantly correlated with metal concentrations at the sites. Ordination of the communities showed that the communities that were low-lying (on the mudflat) were most similar to one another, and those that were higher up on the marsh were most similar to one another. However, diversity indices (Shannon-Wiener H' and Simpson's) were significantly associated with concentrations of the metals (except As) and with the sum of the toxic units at a station.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Rutgers University, Newark, NJ 07102, USA. jweis@andromeda.rutgers.edu
authors.forename: Judith S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Weis
authors.forename: Joan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Skurnick
authors.forename: Peddrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Weis
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D044822:Biodiversity; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004785:Environmental Pollutants / Q000032:analysis*; D019015:Geologic Sediments / Q000032:analysis*; D019216:Metals, Heavy / Q000032:analysis*; D009515:New Jersey; D013054:Spectrophotometry, Atomic; D014872:Water Movements
chemical_list: D004785:Environmental Pollutants; D019216:Metals, Heavy