FISHERY BULLETIN: VOL. 70, NO. 2 



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Figure 7. — Temperature-salinity diagram for Riceboro 

 Creek at U.S. Highway 17; Numbers 1-4 are months of 

 January through April 1969, and 6-12 are June through 

 December 1968. Circles are high tide readings and tri- 

 angles are low tide readings. Cross is high tide value 

 for June and low tide value for July. 



Midway and Mcintosh on dirt road off U.S. High- 

 way 82; (7) Tributary of Ogeechee River at 

 U.S. Highway 17 near the Ogeechee River 

 bridge. 



Habitat 7: Tidal canal — This station is a 

 runoff ditch or canal located in the marsh on the 

 west side of Sapelo Island, 3.4 miles north of 

 the Sapelo airport. This ditch is open to a poly- 

 haline river (Mud River) at all tide levels and 

 its mud banks are under several feet of water 

 at high tide. Water depth was 3 to 4 ft at low 

 tide in the deepest section, which was located 

 at the end of a road culvert on the salt marsh 

 side of a road. 



Habitat 8: Low-salinity tidal pools — Two 

 small pools located next to the road on the west 

 side of Sapelo Island are treated together in the 

 text. These pools are located 4.1 miles north 

 of the Sapelo airport on the west side of the 

 road. Runoff water flooding through a culvert 

 opening into the lower and larger pools has 

 eroded the bottom to a depth of approximately 

 5 ft. A higher culvert opening to the upper 

 and smaller pool rarely has runoff water. This 

 pool is 3 to 4 ft deep. At low tide only trickles 

 of water connect the two pools and drain the 

 lower pool through the marsh. Located behind 

 the high marsh, these pools are flooded by Mud 

 River only on high tide. 



Habitat 9: High-salinity tidal pools (Figure 

 8) . — These are a series of artificial pools located 

 on the south end of Sapelo Island along a road 

 leading to the Sapelo lighthouse, hence the local 

 name lighthouse ponds. The pools are located 

 behind a high marsh characterized by Spartina 

 alterniflora and Juncus roemerianus. The pool 

 sampled on the west side of the road is flooded 

 by waters from South End Creek and the Ma- 

 rine Institute's boat basin. Two pools sampled 

 on the east side of the road are connected at high 

 tide and are flooded by waters from Deans 

 Creek. Palaemonetes piigio was abundant in 

 seine collection, except during the coldest weeks 

 when the water temperature approached 8°C. 

 At this time the fishes were also scarce or absent, 

 and the relatively sterile and clear water allowed 

 the author to see the bottom of the pools where- 

 as the water was very turbid during other 

 months. 



METHODS 



I seined shallow estuarine habitats (habitats 

 1, 5, 7, 8, and 9 and 4 in part) with a 35-ft 

 (10.7-m) seine having 14-inch (6.35-mm) bar 

 mesh; a 10-ft (3.05-m) version was used in 

 freshwater creeks. For habitat 3 I used the rec- 

 ords of Miller and Jorgenson (1969) who col- 

 lected with 40- and 70-ft (12.2- and 21.4-m) bag 

 seines. Their records for St. Simons Island 

 Beach are included in the list for habitat 1. 



Habitat 2 (trawl stations 1-9, 12-14 in Fig- 

 ure 1) and the lower part of habitat 4 (trawl 



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