Odum: 



Teal: 

 Odum: 



terms so you could get that last figure. 



It seems to me that you have pretty good measurements or are 

 about to get good measurements on the production and your in- 

 sect consumption, don't you? You could state a limit of accuracy, 

 it might be 20 or 30 percent, whereas your bacteria are based on 

 a bunch of inferences . It might be 100, 000 percent off . 



No, it cannot be 100,000 percent off. 



No, but what 1 was going to suggest, w^hy not work it backwards ? 

 Why don't you concentrate on the export? 



Teal: 



This is Ragotzkie's problem and he is working on it but he has 

 not got it yet. 



Odum: 



If you could get that, then you would have for the first time bac- 

 terial activity in a community. 



Teal: 



That is right, it would be nice and it would be nice to work back- 

 wards. You have these other measurements for the macrocon- 

 sumers and bacterial activity could be found by difference and 

 you would have a better estimate of it. 



Redfield: How are you going to find out how much Spartina goes out to sea? 



There should be a lot of it. 



Ragotzkie: I don't know, but physically it is very difficult. The transport 



would be tremendous during storm tides. These would move 

 out a lot of material in perhaps two or three months when there 

 would be no net consumption. 



Teal: 



Burkholder: 



Redfield: 



Of course if you are going to measure this when it goes out to 

 sea - out of the sound - and then try to figure back to bacterial 

 activity, to make this a complete system you are going to have 

 to have data for all of the consumers in the sound and in the 

 creeks. All these are extracting energy too, and we do not 

 know anything about these yet. 



Isn't a lot of this detritus being sloshed back and forth by the 

 tides ? It goes off the marsh and back again on the marsh. I 

 think it is a very complicated business. 



Very complicated indeed. A single net wouldn't do it. Perhaps 

 you could work back and forth with two nets. 1 would suspect it 

 was a substantial quantity because here, as I see it, this stuff 

 breaks off. It tends to stay in the creeks, with us it goes right 

 up over the top of the marsh and deposits along the highland 

 shore, but I am sure that part of it goes out too. 



105 



