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Long Point's relatively pristine state, as well as its unique geographic location on the Atlantic flyway (major migratory route of waterfowl), between Gulf and Atlantic coast wintering areas and arctic and prairie breeding areas, makes it one of the most important waterfowl staging areas in North America. Long Point's productive wetlands receive the highest waterfowl use of any area on the Great Lakes, regularly supporting hundreds of thousands of waterfowl during spring and fall migration. This high waterfowl use is probably attributed largely to the fact that over 99% of the Inner Bay is covered by submerged aquatic vegetation. This prolific plant growth can be attributed to the shallow waters of the Inner Bay, high nutrient load (entering from Big Creek), and the protection afforded by the Point itself. All species of waterfowl that migrate through Long Point consume large quantities of the tubers, stems, leaves and/or seeds of these aquatic plants in order to accumulate the energy required to fuel their migration as well as to lay eggs once they arrive on their breeding areas. Submerged plants are also consumed by large numbers of invertebrates, fish, mammals, and reptiles. Wild celery (Vallisneria americana) is the most prominent submerged aquatic plant in the diets of ducks at Long Point and it is a particularly important food source for Canvasbacks. The distribution of wild celery has expanded within the Inner Bay, quite possibly in response to water clarification by zebra mussels.
While aquatic macrophytes are fairly resilient to, and often benefit from, natural environmental change (i.e. fluctuating water levels), human activities (sedimentation, dredging, contaminant loading) can have substantial long term effects on the density, vitality and community composition of aquatic macrophytes. The environmental variables which most strongly influence the distribution and abundance of submerged macrophytes in the Inner Bay are nutrient and contaminant concentrations, lake levels (influence on light availability), turbidity, ice scouring, introduced exotics, interspecific competition and substrate and sediment composition.