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Global Change Impacts on the North Carolina Coast

The state of North Carolina can be divided up into three regions: mountains, piedmont, coastal plain. The low-lying coastal plain makes up about 45% of the total land surface of the state but can be further divided into two separate areas; the inner coastal plain and the outer coastal plain, or tidewater (Orr & Stuart, 2000). Tidewater areas are characterized by very flat terrain that is less than 20 feet above sea level and are subsequently dominated by swamps, marshes and other types of wetland and coastal systems. The inner coastal plain is higher in elevation and supports a greater density of trees but is also the home of locally distinct freshwater upland wetlands called pocosins. Representative habitats of the NC outer coastal plain include freshwater systems (including pocosins and rivers), forested systems dominated by loblolly pond and longleaf pines as well as oak-gum-cypress mixed stands, saltwater systems (including salt marshes, brackish wetlands, estuaries and sounds), barrier islands and marine environments (nearshore and offshore).

North Carolina Land Regions

(Orr & Stuart, 2000)

Increasingly, North Carolina is being exposed to a variety of human impacts that degrade and destroy critical species habitat and populations. These agents of change include but are not limited to direct over-exploitation of a particular plant or animal species, degradation of habitat via development and pollution, climate change effects and invasive species introductions. As population growth continues in coastal regions pressures on the areas fragile natural resources become more threatening, and the natural system may become unable to perform many its’ beneficial functions to the landscape. As various forms of anthropogenic change permeate the NC coastal plain and habitats are degraded many of our native species are declining as a response. A critical component to conservation of these any local species is education, and knowing what we need to endeavor to protect against adverse human activities that are becoming globally more pronounced everyday.

North Carolina Coastal Counties

In order to highlight the effects that global change is having on North Carolina coastal species we investigated several endangered and threatened species that exist in this ecosystem. The North Carolina coast is comprised of 20 counties that contain 4 representative habitats; the coastal ocean, barrier islands, saltwater sytems and freshwater systems. To see which species are under threat simply select a habitat and then go to your species group of interest.