Carpinteria Salt Marsh Restoration Plan PDF Download

Carpinteria Salt Marsh is a unique wetland ecosystem in southern California that is home to a diverse community of fish, plants, birds, amphibians, invertebrates, and other aquatic species. This wetland was impacted by the Thomas Fire of 2017 that altered the landscape, affected the soil and sediment composition in the marsh, and clogged channels with burnt debris from the watersheds in the Santa Ynez Range, notably in the aftermath of the January 2018 Montecito debris flow events. These debris flows delivered a poorly sorted mass of boulders, cobbles, gravels, sands, silts, and clays to the nearshore and to Franklin and Santa Monica Creeks which debouch into the marsh. Immediately following the debris flow events, a King Tide delivered more debris from the nearshore into the marsh. In 2018, local city and county agencies began restoration plans to remove post-fire debris and large volumes of sediment from the marsh. Though the efforts to clear marsh channels and ensure a connection to the Pacific Ocean through the barrier beach at the distal end of the marsh remain a priority for management of the marsh, there remain significant long-term adjustments to the increased sediment load resulting from the Thomas Fire. The focus of this research was to determine which areas of the marsh have retained high volumes of fire-related materials using field sampling and ground survey, Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS or drone) imaging, and spatial analysis methods. In turn, the research would provide a cost-effective method to predict areas which merit attention for restoration efforts. Ultimately, the results of this research provide the foundation for land managers to rationalize where to focus efforts to maintain marsh health. This research collected random strata samples in the salt marsh to examine any fire-produced material from the Thomas Fire and measured the depth at which the material was found. The research further explored spatial and geospatial modeling in Kriging, more precisely Exponential Kriging to predict where fire-produced materials are found. Thirty-seven out of sixty samples were shown to have evidence of burnt-like materials averaging within 5 cm - 12 cm. The exponential kriging semivariogram measured that at the range of distances from 0.84 m to 4.20 m points show that they are spatially autocorrelated while at the sill of distances from 6.7 m to 9.25 m are no longer spatially autocorrelated. The Root Mean Square Value was calculated at 10.54 compared to other statistical models, Spherical and Gaussian. There are numerous explanations as to why the predicted model was insignificant however this demonstrated the potential of combining field work and spatial analysis applications to further guide land managers to operate restoration efforts.