Atlantic Coast Beaches
Table of Contents |
Preface: A Seashell Bias |
ix |
1. Geology of the Atlantic Coast |
1 |
|
Different Kinds of Beaches |
1 |
|
Thi Geologic Setting |
6 |
|
The North-South Dichotomy |
8 |
|
Continental Glaciation |
10 |
2. Beach Movement |
16 |
|
Time and the Beach: The Short Life of Sand Castles |
17 |
|
Sea Level Rise: Time's Tide |
21 |
|
Barrier Islands: Hot Dogs, Drumsticks, and Broken Spits |
27 |
|
Beach Erosion and Accretion: Moving Beaches |
42 |
3. Oceans in Motion |
50 |
|
Perfect Storms: Hurricanes and Nor'easters |
50 |
|
Beach Battle Zone: Tides, Waves, and Currents |
57 |
|
The Tide |
57 |
|
Storm Surge |
59 |
|
Waves |
60 |
|
Currents |
63 |
4. Stories in a Grain of Sand |
60 |
|
As Measureless as Sand on the Seashore: What Sand Grains Tell Us |
67 |
|
Beach Sediment: Size, Shape, and Sorting |
68 |
|
Common Minerals of the Beach: A Mineral Collection in a Handful of Sand |
74 |
|
Mineral Stability |
75 |
|
Black Sands: Pollution or Provenance? |
80 |
|
Other Black Material |
86 |
5. Beach Shape |
90 |
|
The Shape of the Beach: Bars, Berms, and Troughs |
91 |
|
Beach Terminology |
92 |
|
Scarps and Cusps |
96 |
|
The Sea's Cutting Edge: Wrack and Ruin |
98 |
|
Shipwrecks: The Ultimate Wrack |
104 |
|
Wave, Wind, and Current Ripple Marks |
105 |
6. Can You Read a Beach |
113 |
|
Sea Suds: Froth, Foam, and Phantom Marks |
113 |
|
To-and-Fro on the Beach: Swash, Backwash, and Wind Structures |
119 |
|
Diamond Patterns and Zebra Stripes |
122 |
|
Layers in a Ditch: What's Under the Beach |
127 |
|
Pages of Time: Beach Layers |
127 |
|
Bioturbation |
130 |
|
Bubbly Beaches: Holes, Blisters, Pits, and Rings |
132 |
|
Make Your Own Structures |
140 |
|
Holes and Critters |
141 |
|
Knee-Deep in Sand: Soft Sand |
142 |
|
Leaky Beaches: Groundwater in the Beach |
145 |
|
Squeaky Beaches: Barking and Singing Sand |
150 |
|
Booming Sand |
152 |
|
Leave Only Your Footprints: Burrows, Tracks, and Trails |
152 |
|
Beach Critters: Little Ones and Big Ones |
154 |
|
Beach Traces |
155 |
|
Beach-Dune Transition |
160 |
|
The Solution to the Mystery |
162 |
7. Shells |
163 |
|
Recently Alive or Long Dead? Beach Fossils |
164 |
|
Other Fossils and Artifacts |
168 |
|
Staining and Rounding: More Than Meets the Eye |
169 |
|
Preferred Orientation: Hydrodynamics and Aerodynamics |
173 |
8. Dunes and Winter Beaches |
175 |
|
Dunes: Banked Sand |
175 |
|
Beaches and Dunes |
175 |
|
Vegetation and Dunes |
180 |
|
Active Dunes |
184 |
|
Plant Succession |
186 |
|
Dunes and Beaches |
189 |
|
Winter Beaches: Frozen Features of the North |
190 |
9. Saving Beaches or Killing Them? |
196 |
|
Concrete Beaches: The Suburbanized Shore |
197 |
|
Why Hard Stabilization is Bad for Beaches |
200 |
|
Sea Bright, New Jersey |
201 |
|
Obstructions on the Beach |
203 |
|
Artificial Beaches and Dunes: Virtual Reality? |
204 |
|
Artificial Dunes |
217 |
|
Beach Bulldozing and Sweeping |
1219 |
|
How Beach Resorts Age: The Evolution of Beach Communities |
220 |
10. Epilogue |
225 |
|
The Future of Beaches: Are Beaches an Endangered Species? |
226 |
|
Fifteen Ways to Conserve a Beach for Future Generations |
228 |
Glossary |
231 |
References |
238 |
Index |
240 |
