Research Training Group 2530Installation of the research sites completed

21 March 2022, by RTG2530

More than 500 meter of boardwalks, lots of mud and hard work: It took almost half a year to complete the installations at the research sites of Research Training Group 2530. We have captured impressions of the construction along the Elbe estuary in videos.

The sound resembles that of a jackhammer. But there is no concrete in the marsh and no road to demolish. The device that sounds like a jackhammer helps the research team build their research site. They use it to drive wooden stakes into the marsh's soil on which boardwalks got fixed. And about 1.600 of these stakes have been driven into the marsh by the doctoral researchers of the Research Training Group 2530 as well as employees of the Landesbetrieb für Küstenschutz, Nationalpark und Meeresschutz Schleswig-Holstein (LKN.SH) in the past months at three different locations: at Kaiser-Wilhelm-Koog, in Hollerwettern and in the Haseldorfer Marsch in Hohenhorst. These are now the three main research sites of Research Training Group 2530.

The boardwalks give the Doctoral Researches access to all zones of the marsh while protecting the vegetation from damage. In the coming years, the team will collect data for the research project: in the open water of the estuary (with the help of research vessels), in the tidal flats, and in the marshes covered by plants. They will study vegetation, especially species and phenology, measure greenhouse gases, take soil and plant samples, measure soil temperature and redox potential, study root dynamics and decomposition of organic material in the soil, and set live traps for small mammals. 

The data will be used to investigate the influence of plants, microorganisms and animals on the carbon cycle of the estuary and to clarify how human influence, for example grazing by sheep or climate change, affects the cycle. The results will be transferred to estuaries worldwide. 

Construction began in September 2021 and was completed this January. No sound of a jackhammer pierces the air anymore - only the rustling of the reeds and the blocking of sheep on the dike can be heard. Now the research work along the Elbe estuary can begin.