flushing, pollution does not accumulate in the creek; blue crabs and shrimp harvested here are safe to eat.
Attached to the dock and its pilings are barnacles, oysters, seaweeds and a variety of encrusting marine life known as hydrazoans, anthozoans, and ascidians. Because they strain microscopic particles from the water, including harmful microorganisms associated with animal waste, oysters from the creek by the campus and many other tidal creeks and rivers near human and animal habitation cannot safely be consumed. Attached and clinging to the stalks of the salt marsh grasses are ribbed mussels and periwinkle snails. In higher marsh sandy zones, fiddler crabs dig burrows, feed, and interact. The one enlarged chela (claw) of the male is useful for defense and communication but it is not effective for food gathering. As a result, males must spend twice as much time feeding as the females, which have two small chelae.
A non-natural, but common element of the salt marsh is marine debris: plastic containers, Styrofoam, cans, and other material of human origin, which ends up along coastal shorelines. These materials come from commercial and recreational boats and ships, marinas and docks where trash containers are absent or overflowing, construction sites and vehicles on roadways near the water, and from deliberate littering. Debris is constantly being redistributed on coastal shores by the action of tides, winds, and waves. Based upon a 1992 study of the rates of accumulation at four sites in Chatham County, over 40,800 kg or 40.8 metric tons of marine debris wash up on coastal shorelines in Chatham County annually (Gilligan et al).
The maritime influence on the campus climate and vegetation is significant. In the spring when it is somewhat hot and humid inland, the campus has cool breezes from the still-cold tidal waters, a form of natural air conditioning. In winter, the relatively warmer tidal waters can prevent vegetation from freezing. For example, cabbage palms, a distinctive tropical element of the low country, only grow naturally close to salt marshes.
Most of the natural and developed parts of the campus contain major elements of the maritime live oak forests, which characterizes the low country and its barrier islands. Well over 100 species of trees, shrubs, vines, and grasses can be found on or near the campus. The most notable and distinctive vegetative elements of the campus are the size and number of canopy trees (live oak, cabbage palm, loblolly pine, southern magnolia) and the large number of oak tree species.
Between the Marine Biology Building and dock are a weeping willow and red mulberry. A larger red mulberry is located directly behind the Kennedy Fine Arts Building. Adjacent to the Marine Biology Building along the marsh is an eastern red cedar, which is characterized by its dark, green, scaly leaves and light brown, fibrous bark and some very tall and old cabbage palms. The smaller variety of palm found in low-lying wooded areas is the saw palmetto because it has saw tooth edges at the base of the frond stems. Near the entrance to the Marine Biology Building are two sweet gum or gum-ball trees. Their star-shaped leaves are fragrant when crushed, and their fruit are round and prickly. Directly in front of the building are live oaks, so-called because they do not lose their leaves and look "dead" in winter. Hanging from them is Spanish moss which is neither Spanish nor a moss since it produces small green flowers. It is a bromeliad (air plant) obtaining its nutrients from debris on the branches. It does not harm the host tree but can reduce nut production in pecan trees.
Along the marsh directly behind Camilla-Hubert Hall are several laurel oaks between the parking lot and marsh. The leaves are elliptic, black and deeply furrowed. Bordering the east entrance to the building is a yucca or Spanish bayonet, a desert plant with succulent leaves with a sharp point, wax myrtle, a shrub with small gray, aromatic leaves and white berries, azaleas, and a hickory tree.
Across the street on Felix J. Alexis Circle 