ESTUARIES: A NEGLECTED RESOURCE COMPLEX 



By Dr. Stanley A. Cain* 



Dr. Stanley A. Cain 



You are familiar with our estuaries -- 

 where fresh and salt water intermingle --and 

 you know that they have been largely neg- 

 lected. This is attested by your efforts to 

 preserve some of them in a natural state. I 

 wish, therefore, to emphasize the other words 

 of the title, that 

 estuaries are nat- 

 ural resource 

 complexes. The 

 key word is 



II -1 !l 



complex. 



In general we 

 have tended to 

 think of natural 

 resources as 

 single entities: 

 coal, petroleum, 

 copper ore; air, 

 water, and soil; 

 crop plant and 

 livestock varie- 

 ties; ducks, deer, 

 bass and other 

 fish and wildlife 

 species; lumber, paper pulp, and other forest 

 products; land as open space, building lots, 

 and sites for roads and airports. 



We know that things, conditions, and nat- 

 ural processes in the environment are counted 

 as resources when we have the capability of 

 turning them to human use or meaning. 



We are only beginning to learn that our 

 taking from nature, gradually or suddenly, 

 affects nature more than by simple subtrac- 

 tion, and that the byproducts and wastes of 

 our actions, when added to the environment, 

 do something more than simple addition. 



Long before man's arrival on this earth, 

 the elements of nature were in constant in- 

 teraction. This interaction continues, but on 

 a distorted basis, for man has entered the 

 picture. He adds here, subtracts there. He 

 diverts, changes, improves, destroys. Indi- 

 vidually, a man's effect on nature's rhythm 



^Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Fish and Wildlife and Parks. 

 Remarks at Armual Meeting of the Salt Pond Areas Bird Sanctuary I 



may be minor. Collectively, however, it can 

 and often is catastrophic. 



Let us look at these facts: 



. . . Resources interact with nature 

 . . . Men can and do use resources in wide- 

 ly different ways 

 . . . Resources are extremely complex, ex- 

 isting in mixtures and blends 



Man, individually and collectively, changes 

 an ingredient here, alters a cycle there --and 

 it is clear that the concoction he has cooked 

 up is far different from what nature would be 

 otherwise. The result often becomes unpal- 

 atable --in fact sometimes downright poison- 

 ous --to him and certainly to nature. 



The interference with the complexities of 

 nature can be illustrated by considering our 

 forest, grasslands, and deserts; our oceans, 

 lakes, and streams. 



Remarkable World of Estuaries 



And estuaries are outstanding examples 

 of such complexes. Here the fresh waters of 

 streams meet the salt waters of the sea, 

 bound on the landward side by the limit of 

 tidal and wave influences and seaward by off- 

 shore bars and open ocean. Everywhere 

 within, it is a maze of stream and tidal chan- 

 nels, bottoms of peat and muck, silt and sand, 

 and patches, islands, and peninsulas of marsh 

 and salt -tolerant brush. 



Estuaries are a happy land, rich in the 

 nutrients of the continent itself, stirred by 

 the forces of nature like the soup of a French 

 chef; the home of myriad forms of life from 

 bacteria and protozoans to grasses and mam- 

 mals; the nursery, resting place, and refuge 

 of countless species whose urges cause them 

 to migrate or to seek varying habitats for 

 youth, maturity, and old age. 



And estuaries are an unhappy land because 

 of pollution, dredging, and filling, and all 



nc, Falmouth, Mass., August 11, 1966. 



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