for conversion of plant matter to benthic inverte- 

 brates but also as a major location for feeding by 

 the baitfishes, which are planktivorous, herbivo- 

 rous, or detritivorous. These baitfishes then con- 

 tribute to another set of very important estuarine 

 food chains. They are major prey for wading birds, 

 aerial-searching birds, piscivorous ducks, and 

 many predatory fishes. Many marine fishes are 

 also dependent upon intertidal flats in critical 

 postlarval stages because they need the shallows 

 for protection from their predators. 



Intertidal flats are important in their own 

 right as producers of utilizable plant matter. But 

 perhaps even more significant is their function as 

 the primary estuarine habitat where plant produc- 

 tion from other habitats of the estuary is con- 



verted into animal biomass. Some of this animal 

 biomass is commercially important and directly 

 harvested (oysters, hard clams), but most of it 

 fuels food chains that lead to important piscivo- 

 rous vertebrates (wading birds, some diving ducks, 

 several important sport and commercial fishes), or 

 to bottom-feeding vertebrate and invertebrate 

 predators (blue crabs, shorebirds, and several im- 

 portant benthic-feeding fishes). In other words, 

 intertidal flats are most important for what consis- 

 tently happens on them rather than what is per- 

 manently found on them. They are tremendously 

 important to the functioning of the entire estu- 

 arine system. Without them, many of the valu- 

 able aspects of the estuarine system would be 

 threatened, and the \alue of the estuary would be 

 diminished. 



63 



