Professor

F. O. Bateman Distinguished Professorship

Dr. Andy NymanWetland Wildlife Ecology

School of Renewable Natural Resources
Louisiana State University Agricultural Center
Louisiana State University
Baton Rouge, LA 70803


phone: (225) 578-4220
email:
jnyman@agcenter.lsu.edu or
jnyman@lsu.edu

 

 

 

Purposes of this page are to attract students to courses that I teach, to attract graduate students to my lab, and to communicate research results to peers. From this page you can learn what I’m teaching, what my research interests are, what it’s like to be a graduate student in my lab, and download research publications.

I hold the F.O. Bateman Distinguished Professorship in the School of Renewable Natural Resources at Louisiana State University where I focus on wetland management and restoration.  My experience began in 1985 working 8 days-on and 6 days-off at the Pass A Loutre Wildlife Management Area collecting data, assisting researchers, and enforcing regulations. Since then, I was awarded a M.S. (1989, Wildlife), and a Ph.D. (1993, Oceanography and Coastal Sciences). After my Ph.D., I declined a tenure-track position outside coastal wetlands and instead built a 100% soft-money position at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette where I remained until 2001, when I accepted a tenure-track position in the School of Renewable Natural Resources at Louisiana State University. I have authored or co-authored 85 peer-reviewed publications that span wildlife and fish ecology as well as wetland management and conservation. Since 2013, my publications have been cited over 100 times annually. Orcid recognizes 70 of my peer-reviewed publications (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9792-9072). Scopus recognizes 68 of my peer-reviewed publications, which generate an h-index of 23 based on 2,171 (see https://www.scopus.com/home.uri; Author Identifier 35787242400). 

My work at Pass A Loutre WMA motivated me to study coastal marshes. My 1989 thesis quantified effects of waterfowl management on vegetation and coastal marsh loss. That research also left me wanting to understand how coastal wetlands increase in elevation in response to local subsidence and global sea-level rise. When I began research in 1987, the paradigm was that coastal wetlands offset subsidence and sea-level rise only via mineral sedimentation. The concept of marsh vertical accretion via vegetative growth, introduced in 1980, was virtually unknown. Two of my five most cited papers, published in 1993 and 2006, were instrumental in leading to today’s paradigm in which some coastal wetlands, although initiated on mineral sediments, can survive centuries of local subsidence and global sea-level rise by vertically accreting biogenically. My other most cited papers address the effects of oil spills and spill response on coastal wetlands, and wetland loss mechanisms.

Five Most Recent Publications: 

  • Kross, C.S., R.V. Rohli, J.A. Moon, A.M.V. Fournier, M.S. Woodrey and J.A. Nyman.  2023.  Preferred atmospheric circulations associated with favorable prescribed burns in the Gulf of Mexico coast, U.S.A.  Fire Ecology 19:7.
  • Nyman, J.A.  2022.  An Overview of the History and Breadth of Wetland Management. Pages 73-100 In K. Krauss, Z. Zhu, and C. Stagg (editors).  Wetland Carbon and Environmental Management.  American Geophysical Union.  John Wiley & Sons, Inc.  DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0551-7_6  
  • DeMarco, K.E, E.R. Hillmann, J.A. Nyman, B. Couvillion, M.K. La Peyre.  2022.  Defining aquatic habitat zones across Northern Gulf of Mexico estuarine gradients through Submerged Aquatic Vegetation species assemblage and biomass data. Estuaries and Coasts 45:148-167.   
  • Taylor, C.B., J.A. Nyman, and M.K. La Peyre.  2022.  Nekton community dynamics within active and inactive deltas in a major river estuary: potential implications for altered hydrology regimes.  Aquatic Biology 31:1-18. 
  • Tucker, Clay, Jill Trepanier, Pam Blanchard, Edward Bush, James Jordan, Mark Shafer, and John Nyman. 2021. Using Tree-Ring Research to Introduce Students to Geoscience Fieldwork. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, pp. 1-20.  

Five Most Cited Publications:

  • Nyman, J.A., R.J. Walters, R.D. DeLaune, and W.H. Patrick, Jr. 2006. Marsh vertical accretion via vegetative growth. Estuarine Coastal and Shelf Science 69:370-380. DOI: 10.1016/j.ecss.2006.05.041
  • Pezeshki, S.R., M.W. Hester, Q. Lin, and J.A. Nyman. 2000. The effects of oil spill and clean-up on dominant US Gulf Coast marsh macrophytes: a review. Environmental Pollution 108:129-139.
  • DeLaune, R.D., J.A. Nyman, and W.H. Patrick, Jr. 1994. Peat collapse, ponding, and wetland loss in a rapidly submerging coastal marsh. Journal of Coastal Research 10:1021-1030.
  • Nyman, J.A., R.D. DeLaune, H.H. Roberts, and W.H. Patrick, Jr. 1993. Relationship between vegetation and soil formation in a rapidly submerging coastal marsh. Marine Ecology Progress Series 96:269-279.
  • Nyman, J.A., R.D. DeLaune, and W.H. Patrick, Jr. 1990. Wetland soil formation in the rapidly subsiding Mississippi River Deltaic Plain: mineral and organic matter relationships. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 31:57-69.

Personal History:  Born during 1960 in Hattiesburg, Mississippi; raised in New Orleans, Louisiana; married and a father. 

DISCLAIMER: The statements and opinions included in J.A. Nyman’s pages are those of J.A. Nyman (or the oddball hacker) only. Any statements and opinions included in these pages are not those of Louisiana State University, the LSU Agricultural Center, or the LSU Board of Supervisors