Abstract: This analysis of suspended sediment concentration(SSC) was based on abundant in-situ data in recent years.The results show that:（1）the SSC in the Hangzhou Bay is the highest, in the Yangtze estuary is the second, and in the Zhoushan sea areas is the lowest; the SSC reduces gradually from the near-shore areas to the open sea, with higher in the west region and lower in the east region; the SSC shows the trend of increasing firstly from the inner estuary to the mouth, and then decreasing from the mouth to the outer estuary; at the observation stations in the Hangzhou Bay the SSC reduces from west to east.The SSC increases from north to south by transverse comparison of four stations in the outer estuary; the SSC increases generally from surface layers to bottom layers, but the main types of the vertical distributions are different in different waters. (2) The SSC has obvious and complex variations with tidal cycle, resulting from the fluctuations of the tidal currents. In addition, a preliminary analysis of reasons for the temporal and spatial variation characteristics of the SSC in the study area was also made.

Key words: the Yangtze estuary, adjacent sea areas, temporal and spatial variation, characteristics, SSC, the Yangtze estuary, adjacent sea areas, temporal and spatial variation, characteristics