Over the past two weeks the construction of the 40 meter long salt marsh in the flume in Hannover has been begun. After a year of careful preparation and almost two years after initial proposal writing, the plan is becoming reality!
The vegetated marsh blocks will be placed on a sand base. So that part needs to be constructed first. Tons of sand have been moved into the flume by diggers. The front slope up to the test section that will be covered with the saltmarsh plants is now complete and the construction of the rear slope has begun. Luckily the weather is on our side and it is sunny and warm. This is not only nice for the people working but also very relevant for our vegetation that is sitting and waiting in boxes outside. These vegetation sections have been excavated from marshes in the German Wadden Sea and were transported to Hannover by lorry a little over a year ago. Right now, plants may gain some extra vigour from the sun before being placed indoors where it is darker. Ideally, they need to be as strong as their Wadden Sea equivalents, so that they respond in a directly comparable way to the large waves that we will expose them to. However, indoors we will also take good care of them and they will be illuminated by a specially installed lighting system (also now complete). Thanks go to the huge efforts of the construction team!
Follow this blog to discover how the construction continues! Next challenge will be to do some jigsaw puzzling for the critical task of assembling the salt-marsh surface platform from the 200 pallets of marsh blocks.