Sediment and Water Quality in 12 Southwest Australian Estuaries

12 shallow estuaries in southwest Western Australia with sediment loads ranging from 0.2 to 10.8 kg m-2 year-1. The dataset examines relationships between sediment total nitrogen, phosphorus, organic carbon, chlorophyll a, and water column nutrients, linking patterns to soil and bedrock erosion processes. Data was contributed by the Australian Ocean Data Network and last updated in June 2026.

Use Cases

• Modeling the inverse relationship between sediment loads and sediment nutrient concentrations based on mineral influx and sulfidation.
• Analyzing curvilinear relationships between a sediment weathering index and organic matter isotopic values to distinguish erosion sources.
• Investigating patterns of water column total nutrient concentrations with sediment loads to identify thresholds for water quality problems.
• Assessing the potential moderating role of estuary flushing on the impact of sediment loads.

Strengths

• Covers 12 distinct estuaries, providing comparative analysis.
• Includes calculated sediment loads with a defined range of 0.2 to 10.8 kg m-2 year-1.
• Examines multiple interrelated variables: sediment TN, TP, TOC, TS, Fe(II), chlorophyll a, and water column nutrients.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data may reflect geographic bias inherent to the specific estuaries studied in southwest Western Australia.

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network via data_gov_au

Collection Method

Field measurements and calculations from 12 estuaries.

Time Range

null

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06 23 05:00:40.880504; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Wave-dominated estuaries in southwest Western Australia