The Marine Environment: Instructional Resources

The following links provide a wealth of online resources to assist with this unit. Also: at the end of the resources section is a glossary of terms used in the student activities.

Internet

GLBA: Nature and Science, Oceans
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/oceans.htm

Ocean Habitat
http://www.nps.gov/glba/InDepth/learn/about/nature/animals/OceanHabitat.htm

Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve: Intertidal and Subtidal zones
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/intertidal-subtidal.htm

USGS Marine Habitat Studies
http://alaska.usgs.gov/science/biology/seabirds_foragefish/marinehabitat/index.php

Geologic characteristics of benthic habitats in Glacier Bay, southeast Alaska
http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2006/1081/results.html#substrate_map)

Fjord Processes and Oceanographic Dynamics
(Recommended for Advanced Students Only)

Web of Life: kelp forests

Kelp Forests
http://life.bio.sunysb.edu/marinebio/kelpforest.html

Rube Goldberg
http://www.rube-goldberg.com/

Glacier Bay maps
http://www.nps.gov/glba/planyourvisit/maps.htm

Bathymetric maps of GLBA
http://geopubs.wr.usgs.gov/open-file/of02-391/images/L9fig.jpg

Glacier Bay Ecosystem GIS
http://www.inforain.org/alaska/glabaycd/CATALOG/htm/spatial.htm#bathymetry

Sea Otter Projects
http://www.absc.usgs.gov/research/sea_otters/index.htm

Glacier Bay: A Maritime Wilderness
http://www.nps.gov/glba/

http://www.npca.org/stateoftheparks/glacier_bay/

Natural History of Glacier Bay - Geology
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/geology.htm

Natural History of Glacier Bay - Geography
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/geography.htm

Natural History of Glacier Bay - Plants
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/plants.htm

Natural History of Glacier Bay - Animals
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/animals.htm

Natural History of Glacier Bay - Change
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/natural-history-of-glacier-bay.htm

Human History of Glacier Bay
http://www.nps.gov/glba/historyculture/people.htm

Glacier Bay Ecosystem GIS - Effect of a Keystone Species, the Sea Otter
http://www.inforain.org/alaska/glabaycd/CATALOG/htm/seaotter.htm

Map of Glacier Bay National Park (Shows glacial retreat timeline)
www.nps.gov/applications/parks/glba/ppMaps/ACF30C1.pdf

The EPA Global Warning Kids Site
http://www.epa.gov/globalwarming/kids/index.html

Global Warming: Early Warning Sites
http://www.climatehotmap.org/index.html

GLBA Nature and Science
http://www.nps.gov/glba/naturescience/index.htm

Ocean Link
http://oceanlink.island.net/biodiversity/ask/algae.html

USGS Seabirds and Forage Fish, etc.
http://alaska.usgs.gov/science/biology/seabirds_foragefish/foragefish/index.php

Marine Bathymetry: What we learned

Geology Field Notes on GLBA
http://www2.nature.nps.gov/geology/parks/glba/

Glacier Bay: Ice Baby Ice
http://www.pbs.org/edens/glacierbay/ice.html

Glacier Bay: Web Resources
http://www.pbs.org/edens/glacierbay/web.html

Ocean Habitat

Food Webs - Build Your Own
http://www.gould.edu.au/foodwebs/kids_web.htm

Food Chains and Webs
http://www.vtaide.com/png/foodchains.htm

Fun With Food Webs
http://www.harcourtschool.com/activity/food/food_menu.html

Food Chains
http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/Homework/fooodchains.htm

 

GLOSSARY

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Abiotic

Refers to nonliving objects, substances or processes

Abundance

The number of individuals in a stock or a population

Anthropogenic

Caused by, or resulting from, human activities; often used to refer to environmental changes, global or local in scale

Bathymetry

Measurement of the depth of the ocean floor from the water's surface; the oceanic equivalent of topography

Benthic

Organisms (plants and animals) that live at or near the bottom of a sea

Biodiversity

Variety of life forms: different plants, animals and microorganisms, their genes and the ecosystems they form; usually considered at three levels: genetic diversity, species diversity and ecosystem diversity

Biotoic

Refers to living objects, substances or processes

Bloom

Sudden appearance of millions of phytoplankton resulting from increased reproduction due to favorable conditions

Capelin (Mallotus villosus)

A small fish of the smelt family found in the Arctic Ocean in large quantities; in the summer, it grazes on dense swarms of plankton at the edge of the ice shelf.

Chlorophyll

The green pigment of plants that captures the energy from sunlight necessary for photosynthesis

Contraction

A narrowing

Decadal

Occurring over a 10-year period, such as an oscillation whose period is roughly 10 years

Deglaciated

Indicating that glaciers have retreated from the area

Demersal zone

Water that is near to (and, thus, is significantly affected by) the coast or the sea floor

Depth finders

Navigational instrument used to measure the depth of a body of water (as by ultrasound or radar)

Distribution

Geographical area inhabited by an animal species

Ecological niche

The way a species makes its "living"; where it lives, what it consumes, and how it avoids consumption by predators or displacement by other species

Estuarine circulation

Exchange of fresh water and salt water

Estuary

A semi-enclosed coastal body of water with a free connection with the open sea where water is measurably diluted by fresh water

Evolve

To develop gradually

Extrude

To thrust, force or press out

Field guide

Book used to identify animals

Fjord

A glaciated valley flooded by the sea to form a long, narrow, steep-walled inlet, such as Glacier Bay on the SE Alaska coastline

Fjord estuarine system

Two subsystems: subsystem subtidal (deepwater habitats) and subsystem intertidal (wetlands)

Flagellate

Single-cell protista with one or more flagellates, a whip-like organelle often used for propulsion

Forage fish

Small fish which breed prolifically and serve as food for predatory fish

Frontal zone

An interface or zone of transition between two dissimilar bands of water

Gravitational pull

The force that draws all bodies in the universe toward one another

Habitat

• The place occupied by an organism, population or community; it is the physical part of the community structure in which an organism finds its home, and includes the sum total of all the environmental conditions present in the specific place occupied by an organism. Often, a habitat is defined to include a whole community of organisms.
• The home to a particular organism, where the species will attempt to be as adaptive as possible to that particular habitat, in what is deemed their ecological niche

• Homogenous

  All the same

  Hydraulic

  Relating to water in motion

  Intertidal zone

  A zone of transition extending from areas of high tide, that are routinely exposed to air and sunlight, to areas of low tide that are rarely exposed; plants and animals that inhabit this area have adapted to the extreme variability of conditions in and out of water.

  Larvae

  The early, immature form of any animal when more or less of a metamorphosis takes place before the assumption of the mature shape

  Lens

  Cap of less dense water

  Loading

  The quantity of a specific substance present per unit of surface area; also, discharge of nutrients from the watershed into a receiving body such as a lake, stream, wetland or estuary

  Marine substrate

  Earthly material found at the bottom of a marine habitat

  Mean Low Water

  The average level of low water at a place over a 19-year period

  Minuscule

  Very small

  Moraine

  Rocks and soil carried and deposited by a glacier

  Natural History

  Study of animals or plants; sum of the facts about the animals and plants of an area or class

  Nekton

  All aquatic animals that can swim through the water against currents - marine mammals, fish, squid and some crustaceans

  Nutrient

  Any number of inorganic or organic compounds that promote life and growth; nutrients are cycled through food webs.

  Observation

  Watching something and taking note of anything it does

  Oceanography

  Study of the ocean and ocean life

  Parameter

  Characteristic of a population

  Pelagic zone

  Part of the open sea or ocean comprising the water column, i.e., all of the sea other than that near the coast or the sea floor

  pH

  (literally: hydrogen power) A scientific measurement that describes how acidic or alkaline (basic) the water is

  Photosynthesis

  Process by which plants convert water and carbon dioxide into carbohydrates, using sunlight as the source of energy and with the aid of chlorophyll

  Phytoplankton (fyte-o-plank-tun)

  Small, often microscopic, plants and animals floating, drifting or weakly swimming in bodies of fresh or salt water

  Plankton

  A diverse group of minute animals (zooplankton) and plants (phytoplankton) that drift in the water

  Population

  Organisms of the same species that occupy the same area

  Precipitate

  A fine suspension of solid particles (such as silt)

  Predator

  An animal that hunts and kills other animals for food

  Prey

  An animal hunted or caught for food

  Radar

  RAdio Detection And Ranging. An electronic instrument that uses radio waves to find the distance and location of other objects

  Rip

  A stretch of turbulent water in a river or the sea caused by one current flowing into or across another current; a tide rip is a rip caused by opposing tides.

  Salinity

  Degree of saltiness of a given substance such as the ocean

  Sampling

  Policy of inferring the behavior of a whole batch by studying a fraction of it

  Scenarios

  Narrative descriptions of ideas, risks and environmental factors and how they may affect operations

  Sedimentation rate

  Process by which suspended particles in water settle to the bottom

  Sills

  Piles of rocks left over as glaciers retreat

  Stability

  Degree of resistance of a layer of water to vertical motion

  Stratify

  To cut an object of interest into several parts, or strata, which are then analyzed separately; stratification of a population results in subpopulation that can be analyzed separately.

  Substrate

  Surface on which a plant or animal grows or is attached

  Subtidal

  The portion of a tidal-flat environment that lies below the level of mean low water for spring tides; normally, it is covered by water at all stages of the tide

  Sustainability

  A characteristic of a process or state that can be maintained indefinitely; ability of an ecosystem to maintain ecological processes and functions, biological diversity, and productivity over time

  Terminal moraines

  Debris left at the edge of a glacier’s extreme forward movement

  Thermocline

  A boundary layer of water that separates warm, surface waters from cold, deep ocean waters

  Tide rip

  A rip caused by opposing tides (see Rip)

  Tidewater glaciers

  Glaciers that flow into the sea

  Turbidity

  A cloudy condition in water due to suspended silt or organic matter

  Upwelling

  Movement of nutrient rich waters from the bottom of the ocean to the surface

  Variation

  Differences between individuals within a population or among populations

  Water column

  Section of water extending from the surface of a body of water to its bottom

  Watershed

  Total land area from which water drains into a particular stream or river

  Zooplankton (zoo-plank-tun)

  Small animals, or larvae of larger animals, that drift in the ocean that and are eaten by larger fish, marine mammals and invertebrates

 

>>Activity #1
Setting The Scene