Optimizing Methods to Measure Hydrodynamics in Coastal Wetlands: Evaluating the Use and Positioning of ADV, ADCP and HR-ADCP

Hydrodynamic impacts of vegetation in the intertidal zone are highly important to coastal protection. However, most studies on hydrodynamic impacts of vegetation in the intertidal zone are carried out in flumes. This results in a lack of field data for validating models that describe short-term hydrodynamic impacts of vegetation. The current research focuses on field measurements of flow patterns and waves in vegetated intertidal areas. Ample measurement devices are available to measure hydrodynamic processes in the field. Examples are: acoustic Doppler current profilers (ADCP), high resolution acoustic Doppler current profilers (HR-ADCP) and acoustic Doppler velocity meters (ADV). This study focuses on the differences in the performance of these devices, to determine which of them can be best deployed in a future fieldwork campaign in mangroves. Major points of attention in this comparison are the accuracy of the data and the potential disturbance of the measurements by the presence of vegetation. It is concluded that ADV’s perform very well in vegetated intertidal areas, while (HR-)ADCP’s show difficulties when deployed upward looking. Furthermore, ADV’s are preferred over (HR-)ADCP’s due to their ability of combining high frequent wave and current measurements and their convenient deployment.