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Puget Sound Sediment Monitoring Focus Studies

The Puget Sound Assessment and Monitoring Program’s current spatial/temporal monitoring program is designed to characterize sediment condition on a relatively large geographic scale. Smaller-scale focus sediment quality studies can be developed and conducted for any defined embayment of concern in Puget Sound using the probabilistic survey design.

The Marine Sediment Monitoring Team has periodic focus studies built into their future sampling schedule. Focus study locations will be chosen based on topics of concern for the year they are conducted. We welcome opportunities to partner with others (state agencies, local government, tribes, universities, etc.) for these focus studies. Suggestions for the location of the next focus study in 2010, and potential partnerships, can be e-mailed to Maggie Dutch. 

Hood Canal

The first focus study was conducted in Hood Canal in 2004, to provide sediment quality data and information to environmental managers and scientists addressing low dissolved oxygen problems in Hood Canal. These data were included in a report, a summary, and a focus sheet for the Hood Canal Dissolved Oxygen Program that focused on the relationships between sediment-dwelling invertebrate communities and the sediment and water quality parameters in Hood Canal.

 

 

Elliott Bay/Lower Duwamish and Commencement Bay

Focus studies began in Elliott Bay/Lower Duwamish in 2007, and in Commencement Bay
in 2008, as part of Ecology’s Urban Water’s Initiative. Ecology’s Marine Sediment Monitoring Team will conduct current and 5-year interval monitoring in these two urban embayments to assess the overall extent of sediment contamination, changes in sediment quality over time, and the long-term effectiveness of
collective toxics management efforts in these bays.