This is generally a general question, concerning hard science. What sorts of things might one find in a salt marsh? What sorts of colorful plants would one find? And I almost hate to ask, but what sorts of animals would one find there as well? While this could be a salt marsh anywhere, those found in New England are of particular interest to me.
While this is a GQ, I put it in CS, as this concerns a painting. I need some sort of focal point, in which the shape, texture, or color would stand out.
Well you can, at times, find dolphins in the deeper waters that run though a salt marsh. You also get things like fiddler crabs, periwinkle snails, diamondback terrapin.
Also, you will sometimes get areas of higher ground that support things like trees. So you can have a nice oak or some other trees surrounded by miles of marsh grass.
This is all from the salt marshes around Savannah, GA.
Red? Not right here, anyway. Yellow-brown in the fall, but I guess I don’t think of yellow-brown as colorful.
Just remember the trees generally grow alongside a road or in a group on a little hill, not all by themselves in the middle of the flat marsh.
There are also individual boulders sticking up from the marsh, sometimes with a little bit of vegetation on them. They don’t call this the Granite State for nothing.
The loosestrife is a horrible invasive weed. What about a bunch of concerned ecologists attempting to eradicate the plants in question? That would bring struggle and and important questions concerning humanity’s role in destroying and preserving ecosystems into the picture.
Just be careful, if this is a painting for someone else. Loosetrife is not native to the U.S. and is considered by many a dangerous invasive (it tends to crowd out native cattails). So there are many people who wouldn’t like a painting that centers around loosestrife.
IMHO, the loosetrife battle is long lost and we need to get used to it. Though it is a shame that cattails are vanishing so many places.