The Give and Take Of Wetlands
(Part of the wetlands at Shaw Nature Reserve, where I spent my training.)
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When I think of ecological engineering my mind automatically goes to a period of time when I was on my high school’s Envirothon team (extremely dorky, I know). As Envirothon members we explored various components of Missouri wildlife and nature and later tested our knowledge up against other teams in a competition.
My area of expertise was forestry but my best friend focused on aquatics. Since we were friends, we went to all of each others training sessions together so we wouldn’t have to be left alone with other strange Envirothon kids who were overly interested in Missouri’s aquatic and tree situation (thinking back on it now, we were just as weird and strange).
(Here’s proof of our dorkiness- part of my team during a wildlife training session hence the snake)
But by going to all of the training sessions for forestry and aquatics, I ended up learned a lot about wetland mitigation and restoration.
My friend who did the aquatics has long forgotten all of the random extensive knowledge he knew about indicator species in ponds and lakes and I barely can recall any facts about Missouri trees and my identification skills are on the down slope.
But! The information I learned about wetlands has really stuck with me for some unexplained reason and I still really enjoy looking into wetland projects and reading up on it.
Essentially what wetland mitigation is defined as is the creation or enhancement of wetlands to offset impacts of other systems.
Wetlands are recognized as an important factor in keeping ecosystems in tact. The EPA refers to wetlands as an “essential tool” to ensure the “health of America’s watershed.”
Wetlands have many more benefits than just being a nice fixture in nature. They fight the battle against flooding by absorbing overflow, store and filter storm water by absorbing excess nutrients, sediment, and other pollutants. They also replenish groundwater, and they harbor migrating birds along with being a home for a diverse number of species including some endangered species.
So wetland mitigation and restoration has become something that is very important for different communities and areas around the US, like Missouri where 87% of wetlands have been destroyed since the European settlers came.
In the United States a 50% loss of wetlands has occurred and currently 60,000 acres are lost annually.
The EPA actually has a policy called the No Net Loss policy that helps with wetland preservation. The policy’s purpose is to balance the amount of wetlands lost due to economic development by keeping the total acreage of wetlands in the US consistent with no increase of decrease.
For example, the Shaw Nature Reserve, where I originally learned about wetlands, two wetland ponds were built in 2005 to mitigate the damage done to a preexisting wetland when building a new sewer line.
The information on wetlands that I learned and my interest in wetlands in general have stuck with me since my days of environment because I really like the idea of this give and take cycle that wetland mitigation provides.
A lot of times we see natural areas destroyed when construction comes through, but with wetland reservation and mitigation there is a need to replace what was taken and there’s something to be said for that.
I wish that every time we took from an ecosystem would could make up our net loss but since wetlands are considered the most biologically diverse ecosystem and since they provide functions outside of just a pretty habitat, the No Net Loss policy is a good place to start.
Most of my information from this post came from The Shaw Nature Reserve’s website and the EPA’s website.
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