An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environments and are an example of an ecotone. Estuaries are subject both to marine influences such as tides, waves, and the influx of saline water, and to fluvial influences such as flows of freshwater and sediment. The mixing of seawater and freshwater provides high levels of nutrients both in the water column and in sediment, making estuaries among the most productive natural habitats in the world.
A lagoon is a shallow body of water separated from a larger body of water by a narrow landform, such as reefs, barrier islands, barrier peninsulas, or isthmuses. Lagoons are commonly divided into coastal lagoons and atoll lagoons. They have also been identified as occurring on mixed-sand and gravel coastlines. There is an overlap between bodies of water classified as coastal lagoons and bodies of water classified as estuaries. Lagoons are common coastal features around many parts of the world.
The Eel River is a major river, about 196 miles (315 km) long, of northwestern California. The river and its tributaries form the third largest watershed entirely in California, draining a rugged area of 3,684 square miles (9,540 km2) in five counties. The river flows generally northward through the Coast Ranges west of the Sacramento Valley, emptying into the Pacific Ocean about 10 miles (16 km) downstream from Fortuna and just south of Humboldt Bay. The river provides groundwater recharge, recreation, and industrial, agricultural and municipal water supply.
Humboldt Bay is a natural bay and a multi-basin, bar-built coastal lagoon located on the rugged North Coast of California, entirely within Humboldt County, United States. It is the largest protected body of water on the West Coast between San Francisco Bay and Puget Sound, the second-largest enclosed bay in California, and the largest port between San Francisco and Coos Bay, Oregon. The largest city adjoining the bay is Eureka, the regional center and county seat of Humboldt County, followed by the city of Arcata. These primary cities, together with adjoining unincorporated communities and several small towns, comprise a Humboldt Bay Area with a total population of nearly 80,000 people. This comprises nearly 60% of the population of Humboldt County. The bay is home to more than 100 plant species, 300 invertebrate species, 100 fish species, and 200 bird species. In addition, the bay and its complex system of marshes and grasses support hundreds of thousands of migrating and local shore birds. Commercially, this second-largest estuary in California is the site of the largest oyster production operations on the West Coast, producing more than half of all oysters farmed in California.
The Mad River is a river in upper Northern California. It flows for 113 miles (182 km) in a roughly northwest direction through Trinity County and then Humboldt County, draining a 497-square-mile (1,290 km2) watershed into the Pacific Ocean north of the town of Arcata near [California Redwood Coast-Humboldt County Airport] in McKinleyville. The river's headwaters are in the Coast Range near South Kelsey Ridge.
The Big River is a 41.7-mile-long (67.1 km) river in Mendocino County, California, that flows from the northern California Coast Range to the Pacific Ocean at Mendocino, Mendocino County, California. From the mouth, brackish waters extend 8 miles (13 km) upstream, forming the longest undeveloped estuary in the state.
The Coast Range ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion designated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the U.S. states of Washington, Oregon, and California. It stretches along the Pacific Coast from the tip of the Olympic Peninsula in the north to the San Francisco Bay in the south, including Grays Harbor, Willapa Bay, and the Long Beach Peninsula in Washington, the entire length of the Oregon Coast, and the Northern California Coast. Named for the Coast Range mountains, it encompasses the lower elevations of the Olympic Mountains, the Oregon Coast Range, the Californian North Coast Ranges, and surrounding lowlands.
The South Shore Estuary is an estuary located along the south shore of Long Island, between the mainland and the outer barrier islands, in eastern New York state. It stretches for over 70 miles (110 km) from West Bay in Nassau County to the Shinnecock Bay in Suffolk County.
Freshwater Lagoon is the northernmost and smallest of three similar lagoons within Humboldt Lagoons State Park, along the coast of Humboldt County, California, United States.
Stone Lagoon is the second of three similar lagoons within Humboldt Lagoons State Park, along the coast of Humboldt County, California.
Big Lagoon is the southernmost and largest of three similar lagoons within Humboldt Lagoons State Park, along the coast of Humboldt County, California.
Reedy Lake, historically also known as Lake Reedy, is a shallow 5.5-square-kilometre (2.1 sq mi) intermittent freshwater lake or swamp on the lower reaches of the Barwon River, on the Bellarine Peninsula southeast of Geelong in the Australian state of Victoria.
The San Diego National Wildlife Refuge Complex is a series of wildlife refuges established by the United States National Wildlife Service beginning in 1972. The complex incorporates five refuges in San Diego County and Orange County in California.
The Tijuana River Estuary is an intertidal coastal wetland at the mouth of the Tijuana River in San Diego County, California, in the United States bordering Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico. It is the location of the Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve, Tijuana Slough National Wildlife Refuge, Border Field State Park, and Tijuana River Valley Regional Park. The estuary is a shallow water habitat. Often termed an intermittent estuary since its volume is subject to the discharge controlled by the seasons of the year, the volume of the estuary fluctuates and at times there is dry land, or flooded areas. It was designated a National Natural Landmark in 1973.
Moulting Lagoon Important Bird Area is a composite wetland site in eastern Tasmania, Australia. It comprises two adjacent and hydrologically continuous wetlands – Moulting Lagoon and the Apsley Marshes – at the head of Great Oyster Bay, near the base of the Freycinet Peninsula, between the towns of Swansea and Bicheno. Both components of the site are listed separately under the Ramsar Convention as wetlands of international significance. Moulting Lagoon is so named because it is a traditional moulting place for black swans. It is an important site for waterbirds.
The Lake Superior National Estuarine Research Reserve includes land and water areas along the St. Louis River and Lake Superior in Douglas County, in the northwest corner of Wisconsin, United States. It is one of 29 National Estuarine Research Reserves. The Reserve is operated as a program of the Natural Resources Institute of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Division of Extension. It has an area of 16,697 acres (6,757 ha), and was designated in 2010.
The U.S. state of Texas has a series of estuaries along its coast on the Gulf of Mexico, most of them bounded by the Texas barrier islands. Estuaries are coastal bodies of water in which freshwater from rivers mixes with saltwater from the sea. Twenty-one drainage basins terminate along the Texas coastline, forming a chain of seven major and five minor estuaries: listed from southwest to northeast, these are the Rio Grande Estuary, Laguna Madre, the Nueces Estuary, the Mission–Aransas Estuary, the Guadalupe Estuary, the Colorado–Lavaca Estuary, East Matagorda Bay, the San Bernard River and Cedar Lakes Estuary, the Brazos River Estuary, Christmas Bay, the Trinity–San Jacinto Estuary, and the Sabine–Neches Estuary. Each estuary is named for its one or two chief contributing rivers, excepting Laguna Madre, East Matagorda Bay, and Christmas Bay, which have no major river sources. The estuaries are also sometimes referred to by the names of their respective primary or central water bodies, though each also includes smaller secondary bays, inlets, or other marginal water bodies.
This is a list of lagoons of California in the United States. According to the Oxford Dictionary of Ecology and Conservation a lagoon is "a body of shallow water with access to a larger body that is restricted by a coral reef or sandbar." Lagoons in Southern California tend to be estuarine bodies with depths of 2 m (6.6 ft) or less. After more than a century of severe ecological disruption, many of California's lagoons have been targeted for restoration, including San Elijo, Malibu, Colorado, and several others.
