'Ghost forests' threaten New Jersey's wildlife and fresh water supply

Tamara Walker, Asbury Park Press
·2 min read

The Atlantic white cedar trees in the Pinelands of New Jersey are dying.

Atlantic white cedar forests are valuable to wildlife and filter water for nearby counties, according to the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.

At one time, Atlantic white cedar occupied more than 125,000 acres in New Jersey, but that number has declined to less than 25,000 acres in recent years.

Natural weather events like Superstorm Sandy create climate change cycles that ultimately cause a decrease in fresh water for the tree soil. Seawater encroaches on the land, poisoning trees that relied on fresh water.

"Ghost forests are areas of dead trees that lie near sea level killed by invasive salt water," said David Robinson, the state climatologist at Rutgers University.

"They are ecosystems that have been impacted by intrusions of salt water due to sea level rise and surges of salt water along the coast and up streams near coasts," he said.

This affects the Kirkwood-Cohansey water-table aquifer system that covers 3,000 square miles throughout the New Jersey Pine Barrens and coastal plains. The reservoir is estimated to contain over 17 trillion gallons of the purest water, supplied to neighboring counties and municipalities.

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection has a robust natural resource damage program to restore impacted natural resources to their pre-discharge condition. The New Jersey Forest Service seeks to restore 1,000 acres of cedar per year for 10 years, for a total of 10,000 acres.

What is a ghost forest?

A ghost forest is a patch of decayed trees, killed by saltwater that has encroached on the land because sea levels have risen,

What is the Kirkwood-Cohansey water-table aquifer?

The aquifer is an underground reservoir containing 17 trillion gallons of fresh water. It is a shallow, unconfined water table in the ground just below the land’s surface.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: New Jersey water and ecosystem threatened