The Romberg Tiburon Center for Environmental Studies Why is it Here ? by Jim Kelley

10/4/2015 jim kelley Why Do We Live in the Bay Area?

San Francisco Bay Makes Life in the Bay Area What It Is

10/4/2015 jim kelley What Do You Think Of When You Hear “San Francisco Bay?”

10/4/2015 jim kelley A Famous Bridge?

10/4/2015 jim kelley A Beautiful Landscape?

10/4/2015 jim kelley Alcatraz?

10/4/2015 jim kelley Fisherman’s Wharf?

10/4/2015 jim kelley Silicon Valley?

10/4/2015 jim kelley Big Boat Races?

10/4/2015 jim kelley An Urbanized Estuary?

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries Are Places Where a River Meets the Sea This May Occur in a Bay, for example… San Francisco Bay Chesapeake Bay Bo Hai Gulf of the Yellow River Thames River Estuary

10/4/2015 jim kelley Bo Hai Gulf Yellow River Thames Estuary

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries Are Places Where a River Meets the Sea Or It May Occur in a Fjord, for example… Oslofjord Puget Sound Cook Inlet

10/4/2015 jim kelley Oslo Oslofjord AnchorageCook Inlet Puget Sound

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries Of Course Deltas Are Also Places Where A River Meets the Sea, But In Deltas the Fresh and Salt Water Mix Turbulently at the Delta Margin, so they Behave Differently from Estuaries. Examples are: – Mississippi River (Historically) – Mekong Delta – The Netherlands (Rhine River Delta)

10/4/2015 jim kelley Erosion of the Mississippi Delta Mekong River Netherlands Rhine

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries Are Important Nursery Grounds for the Ocean Are as Biologically Productive as Irrigated Agriculture on a per square meter basis Are Home to Most of the World’s Human Population The Sites of Most of the World’s Great Cities Are the Most Heavily Affected Parts of the Ocean

10/4/2015 jim kelley Cities on Estuaries San Francisco New York London Rangoon Shanghai Dhaka Bombay Vladivostok Buenos Aires Montevideo Rio de Janeiro Washington D.C. Ho Chi Min City Tokyo St. Petersburg Bangkok

10/4/2015 jim kelley

10/4/2015 jim kelley Sylvia Mc Laughlin, Founder Save the Bay, 1961

10/4/2015 jim kelley Often Estuaries are “Tidal” ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Salt Water Wedge moves Landward on the Flood Tide And Seaward on the Ebb Tide ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ At the Golden Gate this Daily Flow is 6 Times the Volume Of the Mississippi River

10/4/2015 jim kelley Before Oceanographers Looked At the Bay, Engineers Assumed That Since the Tidal Prism is 1/3 of the Volume of the Bay, The Bay Flushes Every Three Days

10/4/2015 jim kelley Tidal Mixing Flushes the Bay Every Three Days Salt Water Bay Water Ocean Water Day 1Day 2 Day 3 The Original Misconception

10/4/2015 jim kelley If the Bay Flushes Every Three Days by Tidal Action, You Can Divert as Much Water as You Like

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries are threatened by: 1. Water Diversion 2. Wetland Loss 3. Invasive Species 4. Pollution

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries are threatened by: 1. Water Diversion

10/4/2015 jim kelley In Estuaries Fresh Water Flows Seaward, Floating on the Salt Water Salt Water is Entrained at the Bottom of the Fresh Water Lens The Fresh Water Lens Becomes Saltier as it Moves Seaward The Salt Water “Wedge” Flows Landward, Against the Salinity Gradient

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuarine Circulation Fresh Water Salt Water

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuarine Circulation Fresh Water Salt Water

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuarine Circulation Fresh Water Salt Water

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuarine Circulation Fresh Water Salt Water

10/4/2015 jim kelley Most of the Estuarine Circulation Is in the North Bay (San Pablo Bay) And the Central Bay

10/4/2015 jim kelley The Salt Water Wedge is not Flowing “Uphill” It is Flowing Across a Salinity Gradient And thus is Flowing “Downhill” From Higher Salinity to Lower Salinity

10/4/2015 jim kelley San Francisco Bay Is Fed by the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers ~~~~~~~~~~~ Together the Drain 43% of The Land Area of California Sacramento Valley San Joaquin Valley

10/4/2015 jim kelley Most of the Water First Falls as Snow in the Sierra Nevada And the Siskiyou Mountains Siskiyous Sierra Nevada

10/4/2015 jim kelley Most of the Water First Falls as Snow in the Sierra Nevada And the Siskiyou Mountains Sierra Nevada Siskiyou Mountains

10/4/2015 jim kelley Annual Mean Total Precipitation

10/4/2015 jim kelley So, in California, The Water is in the North (Green), but The People are in the South (Brown) ~~~~~ This Makes California Politics even more Interesting the They would be Otherwise

10/4/2015 jim kelley So, in California, The Water is in the North (Green), but The People are in the South (Brown) ~~~~~ This Makes California Politics even more Interesting the They would be Otherwise

10/4/2015 jim kelley Actually, Only 15 % Of the Water Diverted From San Francisco Bay Goes to Los Angeles ~~~~~~~~ 85 % Is Used By Central Valley Agriculture

10/4/2015 jim kelley Water Year Inflow Inflow and Outflow (km 3 /year) Outflow

10/4/2015 jim kelley Export Flow (km 3 /year) Water Year Percent Flow Diverted % 20 0

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries are threatened by: 1. Water Diversion 2. Wetland Loss

10/4/2015 jim kelley San Francisco Bay Has Lost 95% Of Its Natural Wetlands In the Past 160 Years Wetlands in 1848Wetlands Today

10/4/2015 jim kelley Wetlands in 1848 Wetlands Today

10/4/2015 jim kelley Hydraulic Mining in the Sierra Raised the Seabed Of San Francisco Bay 1 Meter Before it was Stopped in 1884

10/4/2015 jim kelley Grove Karl Gilbert Studied the Effects Of Hydraulic Mining On The Bay and Delta

10/4/2015 jim kelley The California Academy of Sciences Was Founded in 1853 by 7 Men Concerned About the Effects of Hydraulic Mining Andrew Randall

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries are threatened by: 1. Water Diversion 2. Wetland Loss 3. Invasive Species

10/4/2015 jim kelley Invasive Species…

10/4/2015 jim kelley Often Out-compete Native Species

10/4/2015 jim kelley If Native Species Evolve Without Competition…

10/4/2015 jim kelley Invasive Species Can Easily Take Over Gaspar de Portolá Marching on Monterey

10/4/2015 jim kelley Usually the Native Species Suffer Declines In Numbers and Diversity

10/4/2015 jim kelley In Estuaries Invasive, or Exotic, Species Typically Come In As Larvae in the Ballast Water Of Ships

10/4/2015 jim kelley Although Sometimes Pets Escape, As Do Animals From Live Fish Markets

10/4/2015 jim kelley The Chinese Mitten Crab First discovered In San Francisco Bay in 1992 However it had been Seen in fish markets In the 1980’s A native of The Yellow Sea For Example…

10/4/2015 jim kelley Mitten Crabs Simply Eat Many of The Native Species of the Bay

10/4/2015 jim kelley Tiny Asiatic Clams, However, Filter All the Available Food and Starve Native Species 1 cm

10/4/2015 jim kelley Spartina alterniflora is an invasive cordgrass From the East Coast Just Crowds Natives Out

10/4/2015 jim kelley Invasive organisms account for between 40 percent and 100 percent of the common species, up to 97 percent of the total number of organisms, and up to 99 percent of the biomass Cumulative Number of Invasive Species Number of Species Year

10/4/2015 jim kelley Not only is the number of invasive species increasing, so too is the rate of invasion. From 1851 to 1960, the average rate of invasion of the bay was one new species every 55 weeks; from 1961 to 1995 the average rate increased to one new species every 14 weeks Cumulative Number of Invasive Species Number of Species Year

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries are threatened by: 1. Water Diversion 2. Wetland Loss 3. Invasive Species 4. Pollution

10/4/2015 jim kelley Urban Areas Tidal Wetlands Major Earthquakes Pollution is Roughly Proportional to Population

10/4/2015 jim kelley In Summary: Estuaries Are Important Nursery Grounds for the Ocean Are as Biologically Productive as Irrigated Agriculture on a per share meter basis Are Home to Most of the World’s Human Population The Sites of Most of the World’s Great Cities Are the Most Heavily Affected Parts of the Ocean

10/4/2015 jim kelley Estuaries are threatened by: Ignorance 1. Accidental 2. Planned

10/4/2015 jim kelley John Reber

10/4/2015 jim kelley So Who Cares About Estuaries? Almost Everybody! Although Sometimes They Don’t Know It

10/4/2015 jim kelley At the Romberg Tiburon Center, Scientists Address All of these Threats to the Health of San Francisco Bay

10/4/2015 jim kelley How Did This Happen? In 1975, 36 Acres of the Naval Net Depot Property was Declared Surplus by GSA In 1978, The Property Was Transferred to the CSU In 1976, SFSU Received Permission to Begin Development of a Center for Environmental Studies on the Site

10/4/2015 jim kelley The Three Leading Proposals for the Future of the Site Were: SFSU’s Center Proposal American Youth Hostel’s Proposal for a Hostel on Paradise Drive Marin County’s Proposal for a Boat Park

10/4/2015 jim kelley In 1984, The Center Was Named in Honor of Paul F. Romberg Who Had Led the Effort to Acquire the Property and Build the Center

10/4/2015 jim kelley The Center Has Been Led by a Succession Of Dedicated and Talented Directors: Erwin Seibel: Curt Davis: Mike Josselyn: Franz Andersen: Tim Hollibough: Alissa Arp: Toby Garfield: 2005-

10/4/2015 jim kelley The Center Has Been Led by a Succession Of Dedicated and Talented Directors: Erwin Seibel: Curt Davis: Mike Josselyn: Franz Andersen: Tim Hollibough: Alissa Arp: Toby Garfield: 2005-

10/4/2015 jim kelley The Center Has Been Led by a Succession Of Dedicated and Talented Directors: Erwin Seibel: Curt Davis: Mike Josselyn: Franz Andersen: Tim Hollibough: Alissa Arp: Toby Garfield: 2005-

10/4/2015 jim kelley