ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the properties of sediments and the dynamics of sediment transport and deposition in estuaries and adjacent ecosystems. It describes origin, composition, and distribution of sediments in these coastal environments. Values of mass properties depend on fundamental properties of sediments — grain size, grain shape, and fabric — although it may be less complicated to measure the mass properties directly than to predict them from information on the fundamental properties. Estuarine sediments consist primarily of mineral grains originating from the weathering and erosion of preexisting rock masses or sediments and transported to the depositional site by wind, water, or ice. In near-surface estuarine sediments, biogenic reworking by benthic organisms and resuspension by wind-driven waves and bottom currents cause a continual flux of the fabric of the sediments. The type of burrowing and feeding activities of the benthos modifies the cohesion, compaction, porosity, and water content of sediments.
