Wetlands in Missouri: What is a Wetland?

Whether we call them swamps, sloughs, marshes, or potholes, wetlands are areas where soils normally are saturated or covered with water, at least periodically. Wetlands are areas where the land and water meet. And in those areas, the water determines the nature of soil development and the type of plant and animal communities living in the soil and on its surface. The timing of saturation and the amount and source of water covering the soil determines the kind of wetland.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Soil Conservation Service, Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are four federal agencies with the responsibility to define wetlands and enforce wetland regulations. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, in Section 404 of the Clean Water Act, define wetlands as "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 vegetation typically adapted for life in saturated soil conditions."

Today in Missouri, the term wetlands may bring to mind the many acres of public land in the Department of Conservation's wetland management program, the sloughs and oxbow lakes along the Missouri and Mississippi rivers or the few remnants of the once vast wooded swamps of southeast Missouri. The common element to these and all wetlands is water. But among people's perceptions of wetlands there is often not a common element.

To a naturalist, a wetland is the primordial laboratory of life, a place that eons ago provided the ingredients for today's underground lakes of oil. To a birdwatcher, a wetland is a place to spend many enjoyable hours adding to a lifetime checklist of birds observed. To a duck hunter, a wetland is meant to be used and managed for those memorable bone-numbing November mornings when enjoyment is a good dog,, a heavy cloud bank and a symphony of quacking and honking. To a hydrologist, wetland values relate to a broader perspective - maintaining a healthy water system for the human race. Yet to some people, a wetland is often a miserable bug-infested wasteland that should be drained and put to better use.

Given half a chance, wetlands will not only redeem themselves of the undeserved reputation as mosquito nurseries and wastelands but also prove to have unlimited and irreplaceable values to mankind.

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