DESIGN AND FABRICATION OF A FLUFF LAYER SAMPLER 



Lawrence Mayer 

 University of Maine 



Giselher Gust 

 University of South Florida 



John Riley 



Thomas Christensen 



University of Maine 



Daniel Schick 

 Maine Department of Marine Resources 



ABSTRACT 



Organic-rich detritus from spring blooms settles to the 

 sediments to form an organic-rich layer, which has not been 

 properly sampled to date. We present here a description of a 

 fluff layer sampler ( FLS ) which can obtain this material by using 

 a carefully controlled resuspension followed by in situ 

 filtration. The resuspension takes place in a flume nozzle 

 carefully emplaced at the sediment-water interface, with a bottom 

 friction velocity (u ) of about 0.4 cm/sec. The resuspended 

 material is pumped through a glass fiber filter for return to the 

 surface. This device may be deployed by a SCUBA diver or 

 submersible, using either an independent lander containing its 

 own pump and filter apparatus, or pump and filter apparatus 

 provided by the submersible (e.g., Johnson Sea-Link ). 



INTRODUCTION 



A significant fraction of ecosystem metabolism in coastal 

 and continental shelf systems occurs in the sediments. A number 

 of studies of this sediment metabolism have pinpointed the 

 sediment-water interface as a particularly important zone (e.g. 

 Reimers and Suess, 1983; Silverberg et al . , 1985). In temperate 

 zones, a significant to major fraction of organic matter input to 

 the sediments occurs as a result of settling of the spring bloom, 

 as a result of inefficient zooplankton grazing in the springtime 

 before stratification and warming take place. While this organic 

 input has been inferred from time-series sediment trap studies 

 (e.g., Smetacek, 1980; Wassmann, 1984; Davies and Payne, 1984), 

 the emplaced organic matter lying on the surface of the sediments 

 has not been properly sampled to date. Actual observations of 

 the material are noted only in anecdotal and occasional time- 

 series bottom photo studies (e.g., Lampitt, 1985). Attempts to 

 sample this material do not generally result in material that is 

 dominantly organic (e.g., Christensen and Kanneworff, 1986). 



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