Wetlands also absorb pollutants, preventing toxic elements from flowing downstream or percolating underground. They provide a buffer against waves and storm surges. Wetland plants trap sediment, which stabilizes shorelines. Although wetlands may exist wherever water collects, they often border rivers and lakes, creating spongy coastlines astir with fish, birds, and the drone of mosquitoes and dragonflies.īut wetlands are not just scenic retreats. Wetlands are places where land is permanently or seasonally saturated with water, forming a distinct ecosystem that is both aquatic and land-based. In wetlands, water saturates the soil to form a shallow, aquatic ecosystem. Armed with satellite imagery, hip waders, and a bit of serendipity, she and her team hoped to produce consistent and accurate maps of the entire basin. She said, “In the past, the United States and Canada have had to patch different maps together.” Bourgeau-Chavez uses satellite data to study land cover, and thought she could develop a way to map Great Lakes wetlands. Laura Bourgeau-Chavez, a researcher at Michigan Tech Research Institute (MTRI), was familiar with the problem. While the lakes themselves have been extensively charted, mapping the surrounding wetlands has proven a slippery task. Documenting and protecting wetlands has become crucial to the eight states and two Canadian provinces thronging the lakes. Some of the greatest damage has occurred around the Great Lakes region, home to one of the largest expanses of coastal wetlands in the United States. This encroachment drives away wildlife and contaminates the remaining water. Wetlands are often drained for human development, replaced by steel mills, shipping ports, and homes. Since Thoreau’s time, much has changed, and many wetlands are no longer such wild places. Even the scent was enticing, which he described as the fragrance of Earth itself. ” He found wetlands enchanting, relishing every experience from the sights and sounds to the texture of the mud. I seemed to have reached a new world, so wild a place. Author Henry David Thoreau wrote about wetlands so often he has been called the patron saint of swamps: “I enter a swamp as a sacred place, a sanctum sanctorum.
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