Wetlands of the United States
Encyclopedia
Wetland
s of the United States are defined by the United States Army Corps of Engineers
and the United States Environmental Protection Agency
as "those areas that are inundated or saturated by surface or ground water at a frequency and duration sufficient to support, and that under normal circumstances do support, a prevalence of vegetations typically adapted for life in saturated soils. Wetlands generally include swamps, marshes, bogs, and similar areas."
Wetlands can be valued in terms of their contributions to ecological, economic and social systems. Wetlands service these systems through multiple processes including water filtration, water storage and biological productivity. They also contribute the functions of flood control, providing a nutrient sink, groundwater recharge and habitat.
The United States is a signatory to the Ramsar Convention
, an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable utilization of wetlands. Under the Swampbuster provisions of the Food Securities Act of 1985, farmers who modify existing wetlands may lose their benefits under the USDA farm program. Additionally, every Presidential administration since George H.W. Bush has operated under a "no net loss"
of wetlands federal policy goal.
In the United States
, some wetlands are regulated by the federal government under the Clean Water Act
. Determining the boundary between regulated wetlands and non-regulated lands therefore can be contentious. In reality, there is no natural boundary between the classes that humans define on these gradients (wetland/upland), and this issue is highlighted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's definition from Classification of Wetlands and Deepwater Habitats of the United States, which defines wetlands as "lands transitional between terrestrial and aquatic systems." Regulations to protect water quality and highway safety require that we create arbitrary boundaries within those gradients, but these boundaries are scientifically definable, and consist of areas where three criterion of the presence of hydric soil
s, the presence of wetland vegetation, and the presence of appropriate hydrology
.
Such regulations must be predictable, reproducible, and enforced otherwise there will be a sacrifice of clean water for development in the case of wetlands regulation (or vice versa), or sacrifice safe travel for quick travel (or vice versa) in the case of speed limits. Determining which wetlands are regulated under section 404 of the Clean Water Act or Section 10 of the Rivers and Harbors Act is termed "jurisdictional determination". Determining the boundary of wetland, whether jurisdictional under sections 404 or 10, or not jurisdictional but still meeting the technical definition of a wetland, that is having the soils, vegetation and hydrology criterion met is called a "wetland delineation", and generally is performed by college graduates with natural science or biology degrees working for engineering firms or environmental consulting firms who are familiar with the 1987 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Wetland delineation manual.
Defining a boundary depends upon the ground and vegetation characteristics; it is easier to do where the slope of the land is steeper. Deciding if a wetland is a regulated wetland depends on classifying the water in it as "water of the United States" or not. Classifying water as "of the U.S." or "not of the U.S." for purposes of enforcing the Clean Water Act suggests a natural boundary that probably does not exist in nature, and one that was not created regarding air for purposes of enforcing the Clean Air Act.
Indiana Wetlands are the focus of the U.S. National Wetlands Coalition
, which in turn has become the focus of some controversy over "false fronts," a form of political camouflage.
(NWI) produces and provides information on the characteristics, extent, and status of U.S. wetlands and deepwater habitats and other wildlife habitats. The NWI also produces periodic reports on the status and trends of wetlands in the conterminous U.S. The NWI website includes a Wetlands Mapper.
The Wetlands Geodatabase and the Wetlands Mapper, as an Internet discovery portal, provide technological tools that allow the integration of large relational databases with spatial information and map-like displays. The information is made available to an array of federal, state, tribal, and local governments and the public. The Service’s wetlands data forms a layer of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) and is an important component of Department’s geospatial line of business portfolio and actively supports the E-government initiative through the Geospatial One- Stop and The National Map.
information.
The Wetlands Geodatabase is one of the world’s largest polygonal datasets (in the civilian sector). The information is increasingly popular and widely used to help identify, conserve, and restore wetland resources across the American landscape. During 2008, the number of website user requests for data exceeded 56.9 million. The Service continues to point large data users to the Web Map Service (WMS) capability. This option provides Federal and State agencies as well as large institutional users an opportunity to establish Open Geographic Consortium (OGC) linkages to ensure they are getting the latest and most complete digital data set. There were also 867 technical assistance requests in 2008.
Currently the Wetlands Geodatabase contains over 34,500 7.5 minute map areas in a seamless ArcSDE geodatabase format. This represents wetland map data for approximately 64 percent of the conterminous U.S., 30 percent of Alaska, 100 percent of the windward islands of Hawaii, 77 percent of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands and, 100 percent of Guam and Saipan in the Pacific Trust Territories. By the end of 2008 the Wetlands Geodatabase contained 67 gigabytes of data including 14.9 million polygonal features. The current status of on-line wetlands data is shown in the Figure 1.
Web accessible geospatial wetlands data can be found at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife website.
Additional web accessible Geodatabase documentation and information can be found in the Appendix on page 11.
The wetlands data layer is increasing in size each year primarily due to existing analog data being converted to vector or raster images. Contributed data from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Regulatory Database (ORM2), other Federal, State and local organizations is also increasing. More and newer data will need to come from other sources in the future to achieve the goals of producing a complete data layer for the Nation and keeping it current.
Wetland
A wetland is an area of land whose soil is saturated with water either permanently or seasonally. Wetlands are categorised by their characteristic vegetation, which is adapted to these unique soil conditions....
s of the United States are defined by the United States Army Corps of Engineers
United States Army Corps of Engineers
The United States Army Corps of Engineers is a federal agency and a major Army command made up of some 38,000 civilian and military personnel, making it the world's largest public engineering, design and construction management agency...
and the United States Environmental Protection Agency
United States Environmental Protection Agency
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is an agency of the federal government of the United States charged with protecting human health and the environment, by writing and enforcing regulations based on laws passed by Congress...
as "those areas that are inundated or saturated by surface or ground water at a frequency and duration sufficient to support, and that under normal circumstances do support, a prevalence of vegetations typically adapted for life in saturated soils. Wetlands generally include swamps, marshes, bogs, and similar areas."
Wetlands can be valued in terms of their contributions to ecological, economic and social systems. Wetlands service these systems through multiple processes including water filtration, water storage and biological productivity. They also contribute the functions of flood control, providing a nutrient sink, groundwater recharge and habitat.
The United States is a signatory to the Ramsar Convention
Ramsar Convention
The Ramsar Convention is an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable utilization of wetlands, i.e., to stem the progressive encroachment on and loss of wetlands now and in the future, recognizing the fundamental ecological functions of wetlands and their economic, cultural,...
, an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable utilization of wetlands. Under the Swampbuster provisions of the Food Securities Act of 1985, farmers who modify existing wetlands may lose their benefits under the USDA farm program. Additionally, every Presidential administration since George H.W. Bush has operated under a "no net loss"
No net loss wetlands policy
"No net loss" is the United States government's overall policy goal regrading wetlands preservation. The goal of the policy is to balance wetland loss due to economic development with wetlands reclamation, mitigation, and restorations efforts, so that the total acreage of wetlands in the country...
of wetlands federal policy goal.
In the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, some wetlands are regulated by the federal government under the Clean Water Act
Clean Water Act
The Clean Water Act is the primary federal law in the United States governing water pollution. Commonly abbreviated as the CWA, the act established the goals of eliminating releases of high amounts of toxic substances into water, eliminating additional water pollution by 1985, and ensuring that...
. Determining the boundary between regulated wetlands and non-regulated lands therefore can be contentious. In reality, there is no natural boundary between the classes that humans define on these gradients (wetland/upland), and this issue is highlighted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's definition from Classification of Wetlands and Deepwater Habitats of the United States, which defines wetlands as "lands transitional between terrestrial and aquatic systems." Regulations to protect water quality and highway safety require that we create arbitrary boundaries within those gradients, but these boundaries are scientifically definable, and consist of areas where three criterion of the presence of hydric soil
Hydric soil
A hydric soil is a soil that formed under conditions of saturation, flooding, or ponding long enough during the growing season to develop anaerobic conditions in the upper part....
s, the presence of wetland vegetation, and the presence of appropriate hydrology
Hydrology
Hydrology is the study of the movement, distribution, and quality of water on Earth and other planets, including the hydrologic cycle, water resources and environmental watershed sustainability...
.
Such regulations must be predictable, reproducible, and enforced otherwise there will be a sacrifice of clean water for development in the case of wetlands regulation (or vice versa), or sacrifice safe travel for quick travel (or vice versa) in the case of speed limits. Determining which wetlands are regulated under section 404 of the Clean Water Act or Section 10 of the Rivers and Harbors Act is termed "jurisdictional determination". Determining the boundary of wetland, whether jurisdictional under sections 404 or 10, or not jurisdictional but still meeting the technical definition of a wetland, that is having the soils, vegetation and hydrology criterion met is called a "wetland delineation", and generally is performed by college graduates with natural science or biology degrees working for engineering firms or environmental consulting firms who are familiar with the 1987 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Wetland delineation manual.
Defining a boundary depends upon the ground and vegetation characteristics; it is easier to do where the slope of the land is steeper. Deciding if a wetland is a regulated wetland depends on classifying the water in it as "water of the United States" or not. Classifying water as "of the U.S." or "not of the U.S." for purposes of enforcing the Clean Water Act suggests a natural boundary that probably does not exist in nature, and one that was not created regarding air for purposes of enforcing the Clean Air Act.
Indiana Wetlands are the focus of the U.S. National Wetlands Coalition
National Wetlands Coalition
The National Wetlands Coalition, founded in 1989, has opposed U.S. wetlands policy, saying "the federal government, while seeking to protect wetlands, casts a wide net and imposes burdensome and ineffective regulations on private property that does not function as or provide the ecosystem benefits...
, which in turn has become the focus of some controversy over "false fronts," a form of political camouflage.
Wetlands Loss in the United States
Since the 16th century, more than half of the estimated original 220,000,000+ acres of U.S. wetlands have been degraded or destroyed.National Wetlands Inventory
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's National Wetlands InventoryNational Wetlands Inventory
In the United States the National Wetland Inventory is a Fish and Wildlife Service program started in the 1970s to inventory and map all wetlands, primarily for scientific purposes. It has since been de-funded and most of its data is outdated. The data and maps it produces have been used to track...
(NWI) produces and provides information on the characteristics, extent, and status of U.S. wetlands and deepwater habitats and other wildlife habitats. The NWI also produces periodic reports on the status and trends of wetlands in the conterminous U.S. The NWI website includes a Wetlands Mapper.
The Wetlands Geodatabase and the Wetlands Mapper, as an Internet discovery portal, provide technological tools that allow the integration of large relational databases with spatial information and map-like displays. The information is made available to an array of federal, state, tribal, and local governments and the public. The Service’s wetlands data forms a layer of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) and is an important component of Department’s geospatial line of business portfolio and actively supports the E-government initiative through the Geospatial One- Stop and The National Map.
Geodatabase Characteristics and Status
The Service’s Wetlands Geodatabase contains five units (map areas) that are populated with digital vector data and raster images. These units include the conterminous U.S., Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the Pacific Trust Territories. Each unit of the geodatabase contains seamless digital map data in ArcSDE geodatabase format. Data are in a single standard projection (Albers Equal-Area Conic Projection), horizontal planar units in meters, horizontal planar datum is the North American Datum of 1983 (also called NAD83), and minimum coordinate precision of one centimeter. Links are available to supplemental wetland information and metadata records that are compliant with the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata, Version 2.0. The Wetlands Geodatabase also contains other propriety Service datasets and developmental data, feature classes orinformation.
The Wetlands Geodatabase is one of the world’s largest polygonal datasets (in the civilian sector). The information is increasingly popular and widely used to help identify, conserve, and restore wetland resources across the American landscape. During 2008, the number of website user requests for data exceeded 56.9 million. The Service continues to point large data users to the Web Map Service (WMS) capability. This option provides Federal and State agencies as well as large institutional users an opportunity to establish Open Geographic Consortium (OGC) linkages to ensure they are getting the latest and most complete digital data set. There were also 867 technical assistance requests in 2008.
Geospatial Data Status - Wetlands
In 2008, data covering 66200000 acres (267,902.1 km²) were added to the Wetlands Geodatabase. These included 28100000 acres (113,716.8 km²) of updated wetland map information, new data for 6800000 acres (27,518.6 km²) not previously available and 31300000 acres (126,666.7 km²) of data that were captured in digital format. An additional 8,245 hard copy maps (quadrangles) were added as raster image files.Currently the Wetlands Geodatabase contains over 34,500 7.5 minute map areas in a seamless ArcSDE geodatabase format. This represents wetland map data for approximately 64 percent of the conterminous U.S., 30 percent of Alaska, 100 percent of the windward islands of Hawaii, 77 percent of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands and, 100 percent of Guam and Saipan in the Pacific Trust Territories. By the end of 2008 the Wetlands Geodatabase contained 67 gigabytes of data including 14.9 million polygonal features. The current status of on-line wetlands data is shown in the Figure 1.
Web accessible geospatial wetlands data can be found at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife website.
Additional web accessible Geodatabase documentation and information can be found in the Appendix on page 11.
The wetlands data layer is increasing in size each year primarily due to existing analog data being converted to vector or raster images. Contributed data from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
United States Army Corps of Engineers
The United States Army Corps of Engineers is a federal agency and a major Army command made up of some 38,000 civilian and military personnel, making it the world's largest public engineering, design and construction management agency...
Regulatory Database (ORM2), other Federal, State and local organizations is also increasing. More and newer data will need to come from other sources in the future to achieve the goals of producing a complete data layer for the Nation and keeping it current.
See also
- Mississippi River Gulf Outlet
- National Estuarine Research ReserveNational Estuarine Research ReserveThe National Estuarine Research Reserve System is a program of the United States government. The program establishes federal-state partnerships under the Coastal Zone Management Act to create a system of estuarine research reserves representative of the various regions and estuarine types in the...
- National Estuarine Research Reserve System
- National Wetlands Research CenterNational Wetlands Research CenterThe National Wetlands Research Center was founded in 1975 as part of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Office of Biological Services. Its headquarters are located in Lafayette, Louisiana....
- North American Wetlands Conservation ActNorth American Wetlands Conservation ActThe North American Wetlands Conservation Act authorizes a wetlands habitat program, administered by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, which provides grants to protect and manage wetland habitats for migratory birds and other wetland wildlife in the United States, Mexico, and Canada...
- Wetlands of LouisianaWetlands of LouisianaThe wetlands of Louisiana are water-saturated coastal and swamp regions of southern Louisiana.The Environmental Protection Agency defines wetlands as "those areas that are inundated or saturated by surface or groundwater at a frequency and duration sufficient to support, and that under normal...
- Wetlands Reserve ProgramWetlands Reserve ProgramThe Wetlands Reserve Program is a voluntary program offering landowners the opportunity to protect, restore, and enhance wetlands on their property. The USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service administers the program with funding from the Commodity Credit Corporation.- Establishment :The WRP...
- No net loss (wetlands)
External links
- Federal Register (1996-08-16). "National Action Plan to Develop the Hydrogeomorphic Approach to Assessing Wetland Functions
- National Wetland Inventory
- Brinson, M. M., Hauer, F. R., Lee, L. C., Nutter, W. L., Rheinhardt, R. D., Smith, R. D., and Whigham, D. (1995). "A guidebook for application of hydrogeomorphic assessments to riverine wetlands" Technical Report WRP-DE-11, U.S. Army Engineer Waterways Experiment Station, Vicksburg, MS. NTIS No. AD A308 365.
- Soderberg, J., Stetson, L. (2009) "Utilizing New Technology and GIS to Improve Permitting Programs"