Use of created cattail (Typha) wetlands in mitigation strategies

In order to balance pressures for land-use development with protection of wetland resources, artificial wetlands have been constructed in an effort to replace lost ecosystems. Despite its regulatory appeal and prominent role in current mitigation strategies, it is unclear whether or not created systems actually compensate for lost wetland resources. Mitigation predictions that rely on artificial wetlands must be analyzed critically in terms of their efficacy. Destruction of wetlands due to burial by coal fly ash at a municipal landfill in Danvers, Massachusetts, USA, provided an opportunity to compare resulting growth of created cattail (Typha) marshes with natural wetland areas. Once the appropriate cattail species was identified for growth under disturbed landfill conditions, two types of artificial wetlands were constructed. The two systems differed in their hydrologic attributes: while one had a surface water flow characteristic of most cattail wetlands, the second system mimicked soil and water conditions found in naturally occurring floating cattail marshes. Comparison of plant growth measurements for two years from the artificial systems with published values for natural cattail marshes revealed similar structure and growth patterns. Experiments are now in progress to investigate the ability of created cattail marshes to remove and accumulate heavy metals from polluted landfill leachate. Research of the type reported here must be pursued aggressively in order to document the performance of artificial wetlands in terms of plant structure and wetland functions. Such research should allow us to start to evaluate whether artificial systems actually compensate for lost wetlands by performing similar functions and providing the concomitant public benefits.     

Mapping wetlands in the Lower Mekong Basin for wetland resource and conservation management using Landsat ETM images and field survey data

The Mekong River Basin is considered to be the second most species rich river basin in the world. The 795,000 km(2) catchment encompasses several ecoregions, incorporating biodiverse and productive wetland systems. Eighty percent of the rapidly expanding population of the Lower Mekong Basin (LMB), made up in part by Lao PDR, Thailand, Cambodia and Viet Nam, live in rural areas and are heavily reliant on wetland resources. As the populations of Cambodia and Lao PDR will double in the next 20 years, pressure on natural resources and particularly wetlands can only increase. For development planning, resource and conservation management to incorporate wetland issues, information on the distribution and character of Mekong wetlands is essential. The existing but outdated wetland maps were compiled from secondary landuse-landcover data, have limited coverage, poor thematic accuracy and no meta-data. Therefore the Mekong River Commission (MRC) undertook to produce new wetland coverage for the LMB. As resources, funding and regional capacity are limited, it was determined that the method applied should use existing facilities, be easily adaptable, and replicable locally. For the product to be useful it must be accepted by local governments and decision makers. The results must be of acceptable accuracy (>75%) and the methodology should be relatively understandable to non-experts. In the first stage of this exercise, field survey was conducted at five pilot sites covering a range of typical wetland habitats (MRC wetland classification) to supply data for a supervised classification of Landsat ETM images from the existing MRC archive. Images were analysed using ERDAS IMAGINE and applying Maximum Likelihood Classification. Field data were reserved to apply formal accuracy assessment to the final wetland habitat maps, with resulting accuracy ranging from 77 to 94%. The maps produced are now in use at a Provincial and National level in three countries for resource and conservation planning and management applications, including designation of a Ramsar wetland site of international importance.     

Effect of river sediment on phosphorus chemistry of similarly aged natural and created wetlands in the Atchafalaya Delta, Louisiana, USA

The goal of wetland creation is to produce an artificial wetland that functions as a natural wetland. Studies comparing created wetlands to similarly aged natural wetlands provide important information about creation techniques and their improvement so as to attain that goal. We hypothesized that differences in sediment phosphorus accretion, deposition, and chemistry between created and natural wetlands in the Atchafalaya Delta, Louisiana, USA were a function of creation technique and natural river processes. Sediment deposition was determined with feldspar marker horizons located in created and natural wetlands belonging to three age classes (<3, 5-10, and 15-20 yr old). Phosphorus fractions were measured in these deposited sediments and in suspended and bedload sediment from the Atchafalaya River. Bedload sediment had significantly lower iron- and aluminum-bound, reductant-soluble, and total phosphorus than suspended sediment due to its high sand percentage. This result indicates that wetlands artificially created in the Atchafalaya Delta using bedload sediment will initially differ from natural wetlands of the same age. Even so, similarities between the mudflat stratum of the <1- to 3-yr-old created wetland and the mudflat stratum of the 15- to 20-yr-old natural wetland support the contention that created wetlands in the Atchafalaya Delta can develop natural characteristics through the deposition of river suspended sediment. Differences between three created wetland strata, the 15- to 20-yr-old willow stratum and the <1- to 3-yr-old willow and mixed marsh strata, and their natural counterparts were linked to design elements of the created wetlands that prevented the direct deposition of the river's suspended sediment.     

Wise Use of Wetlands: Current State of Protection and Utilization of Chinese Wetlands and Recommendations for Improvement

Wetland protection and utilization sometimes appear to be in conflict, but promoting the wise use of wetlands can solve this problem. All countries face the challenge of sustainable development of wetlands to a greater or lesser extent, but the problem is especially urgent in developing countries, such as China, that want to accelerate their economic development without excessive environmental cost. Chinese wetlands contribute greatly to economic development, but improper use of these natural resources has endangered their existence. It is thus necessary to provide scientific guidance to managers and users of wetlands. In this paper, we analyze the present status of Chinese wetland protection and utilization, and discuss problems in six categories: a lack of public awareness of the need for wetland protection; insufficient funding for wetland protection and management; an imperfect legal system to protect wetlands; insufficient wetland research; lack of coordination among agencies and unclear responsibilities; and undeveloped technologies related to wetland use and protection. The wise use of Chinese wetlands will require improvements in four main areas: increased wetland utilization research, scientific management of wetland utilization, improved laws and regulations to protect wetlands, and wider dissemination of wetland knowledge. Based on these categories, we propose a framework for the optimization of wetland use by industry to provide guidance for China and other countries that cannot sacrifice economic benefits to protect their wetlands.     

Vegetative Ecological Characteristics of Restored Reed (Phragmites australis) Wetlands in the Yellow River Delta, China

In this study, we compared ecological characteristics of wetland vegetation in a series of restoration projects that were carried out in the wetlands of Yellow River Delta. The investigated characteristics include plant composition structure, species diversity and community similarity in three kinds of Phragmites australis wetlands, i.e. restored P. australis wetlands (R1, R2, R3 and R4: restored in 2002, 2005, 2007 and 2009, respectively), natural P. australis wetland (N) and degraded P. australis wetland (D) to assess the process of wetlands restoration. The coverage of the R1 was 99%, which was similar to natural wetland. Among all studied wetlands, the highest and lowest stem density was observed in R1 and R2, respectively, Plant height and stem diameter show the same trend as N > R2 > R1 > R3 > D > R4. Species diversity of restored P. australis wetlands became closed to natural wetland. Both species richness and Shannon–Wiener index had similar tendency: increased first and then decreased with restored time. The highest species richness and species diversity were observed in R2, while the lowest values of those parameters were found in natural P. australis wetland. Similarity indexes between restored wetlands and natural wetland increased with the restoration time, but they were still less than 50%. The results indicate that the vegetation of P. australis wetlands has experienced a great improvement after several years’ restoration, and it is feasible to restored degraded P. australis wetlands by pouring fresh water into those wetlands in the Yellow River Delta. However, it is notable that costal degraded P. australis wetland in this region may take years to decades to reach the status of natural wetland.     

Waterbird Population Changes in the Wetlands at Chongming Dongtan in the Yangtze River Estuary,China

We studied the changes in wetland habitats and waterbird communities between the 1980s and the 2000s at Chongming Dongtan, a Ramsar site in the Yangtze River estuary, an ecologically important region. This region is an important stopover site for shorebirds along the East Asian–Australasian flyway and is extensively used by waterfowl. A net loss of 11% of the wetland area was estimated during study periods at Chongming Dongtan. The change was dependent on wetland types: while the area of artificial habitats such as paddy fields and aquacultural ponds more than doubled, more than 65% of natural habitats including sea bulrush (Scirpus mariqueter) and common reed (Phragmites australis) marshes were lost over the two decades. An exotic plant species introduced from North America, smooth cordgrass (Spartina alterniflora), occupied 30% of the vegetated intertidal zone by the 2000s. Although waterbird species richness did not change between the 1980s (110) and the 2000s (111), 13 species found in 1980s were replaced by 14 newly recorded species. Moreover, there were more species with declining trends (58) than with increasing trends (19). The population trends of species were affected by residential status and habitat types. Transients, wintering migrants, and habitat specialists were more likely to show declining trends compared to those breeding at Dongtan (including year-round and summer residents) and habitat generalists. Furthermore, species associated mainly with natural wetlands were more likely to decline than those associated mainly with artificial wetlands. These patterns suggest that the loss and change of wetland habitats at Chongming Dongtan adversely affected local population dynamics and might have contributed to the global decline of some waterbird species. Because Chongming Dongtan provides stopover and wintering habitats for many migratory waterbirds, protection and restoration of natural wetlands at Chongming Dongtan are urgently needed.     

Wetland loss and substitution by the Section 404 permit program in southern California,USA

To test the effectiveness of the 404 permit program in preventing a net loss of wetland resources, 75 Section 404 projects permitted in the years 1987–1989 and located in a portion of southern California were evaluated. From this group of projects, 80.47 ha of wetlands were affected by Section 404 permits and the Army Corps of Engineers required 111.62 ha of wetland mitigation. To verify the successful completion of each mitigation project, all 75 project sites were visited and evaluated based on the amount of dead vegetation, growth and coverage, and the number of invasive species. Based on the field verification results, the actual amount of completed mitigation area was 77.33 ha, resulting in a net loss of 3.14 ha of wetland resources in the years 1987–1989. By comparing the types of wetlands lost to the types of wetlands mitigated, it is apparent that, in particular, freshwater wetlands are experiencing a disproportionately greater loss of area and that riparian woodland wetlands are most often used in mitigation efforts. The net result of these accumulated actions is an overall substitution of wetland types throughout the region. Results also indicate that, typically, large-scale mitigation projects are more successful compared to smaller projects and that successful compliance efforts are not evenly distributed throughout the region. We recommend that better monitoring, mitigation in-kind, mitigation banking, and planning on a regional or watershed scale could greatly improve the effectiveness of the Section 404 permitting program.     

拉萨河流域高寒湿地水质影响因子分析

西藏高寒湿地在生态平衡、生态建设和经济社会发展中发挥着重要作用。本文以西藏拉萨河流域内各个典型高寒湿地为研究对象,通过系统聚类法和综合污染指数法,对流域内各项水质指标进行综合分析和评价。结果表明：各个湿地的总N、Cu元素含量都超出了Ⅰ类水质标准;总P、Zn没有超标;Mn元素含量除了塘嘎郭湿地超标3倍外,其他均小于国家标准;Fe元素含量除了塘嘎郭湿地超标7倍外,其他均小于标准。总N、总P、pH值、Cu、Fe等因子对拉萨河流域内各个高寒湿地水质污染贡献最大。拉萨河水体有机污染较重,其余各个湿地有水体富营养化的趋势,同时流域内湿地独特的自然因素造成该流域内重金属污染偏高。对策建议包括应加大对城市污水的治理,加强流域内及周边矿藏资源的开发管理等。     

辽宁沿海经济带滨海湿地资源的开发与保护研究

辽宁省拥有丰富多样的滨海湿地资源.随着辽宁沿海经济带升级为国家战略,滨海湿地资源将面临不同程度的开发影响.从辽宁滨海湿地资源禀赋与开发现状人手,分析了滨海湿地资源开发与保护中存在的主要问题,探讨了滨海湿地在沿海经济带开发中的重要功能与地位,并提出实现滨海湿地资源可持续开发利用的对策建议.     

Wetland cultivation and hydrological management in eastern Africa: Matching community and hydrological needs through sustainable wetland use

Wetlands are critical natural resources in developing countries where they perform a range of environmental functions and provide numerous socio-economic benefits to local communities and a wider population. In recent years, however, many wetlands throughout eastern Africa have come under extreme pressure as government policies, socio-economic change and population pressure have stimulated a need for more agriculturally productive land. Although wetland drainage and cultivation can make a key contribution to food and livelihood security in the short term, in the long term there are concerns over the sustainability of this utilization and the maintenance of wetland benefits. This article draws upon recent research carried out in western Ethiopia, which addressed the sustainability of wetland agriculture in an area of increasing food insecurity and population pressure. It discusses the impacts of drainage and cultivation on wetland hydrology and draws attention to local wetland management strategies, particularly those characterized by multiple use of wetlands, where agriculture exists alongside other wetland uses. The article suggests that where multiple wetland uses exist, a range of benefits can be sustained with little evidence of environmental degradation. Ways of promoting and empowering such sustainable wetland management systems are discussed in the context of the wider need for water security throughout the region.     

Issues and approaches in assessing cumulative impacts on waterbird habitat in wetlands

Wetlands are attractive to vertebrates because of their abundant nutrient resources and habitat diversity. Because they are conspicuous, vertebrates commonly are used as indicators of changes in wetlands produced by environmental impacts. Such impacts take place at the landscape level where extensive areas are lost; at the wetland complex level where some (usually small) units of a closely spaced group of wetlands are drained or modified; or at the level of the individual wetland through modification or fragmentation that impacts its habitat value. Vertebrates utilize habitats differently according to age, sex, geographic location, and season, and habitat evaluations based on isolated observations can be biased. Current wetland evaluation systems incorporate wildlife habitat as a major feature, and the habitat evaluation procedure focuses only on habitat. Several approaches for estimating bird habitat losses are derived from population curves based on natural and experimentally induced population fluctuations. Additional research needs and experimental approaches are identified for addressing cumulative impacts on wildlife habitat values.     

Critique of present wetlands mitigation policies in the united states based on an analysis of past restoration projects in San Francisco Bay

A detailed evaluation of past wetland restoration projects in San Francisco Bay was undertaken to determine their present status and degree of success. Many of the projects never reached the level of success purported and others have been plagued by serious problems. On the basis of these findings, it is debatable whether any sites in San Francisco Bay can be described as completed, active, or successful restoration projects at present. In spite of these limited accomplishments, wetland creation and restoration have been adopted in the coastal permit process as mitigation to offset environmental damage or loss of habitat. However, because the technology is still largely experimental, there is no guarantee that man-made wetlands will persist as permanent substitutes for sacrificed natural habitats. Existing permit policies should be reanalyzed to insure that they actually succeed in safeguarding diminishing wetlands resources rather than bartering them away for questionable habitat substitutes. Coastal managers must be more specific about project requirements and goals before approval is granted. Continued research on a regional basis is needed to advance marsh establishment techniques into a proven technology. In the meantime, policies encouraging or allowing quid pro quo exchanges of natural wetlands with man-made replacements should proceed with caution. The technology and management policies used at present are many steps ahead of the needed supporting documentation.     

ESTABLISHING PRIORITIES FOR WETLAND MANAGEMENT1

Wetlands provide a variety of ecological services, but are attractive sites for many development activities. Between the mid-1950's and mid-1970's about 550,000 acres, or about 0.5 percent, of the vegetated wetlands remaining in the conterminous states were converted to other uses each year. About 80 percent of these losses involved draining and clearing of inland wetlands for agricultural purposes. Recent reductions in national wetland conversion rates are due primarily to declining rates of agricultural drainage and secondarily to government programs that regulate wetlands use. Several governmental policies and programs exist that either encourage or discourage wetland conversions. Section 404 of the Clean Water Act is the major tool for Federal involvement in controlling the conversion of wetlands to other uses. The 404 program, in combination with State regulatory programs, is responsible for reducing annual conversions nationwide by about 50 percent of what is applied for, or 50,000 acres of wetlands per year, primarily through project modifications. Coastal wetlands are reasonably well protected. Inland, freshwater wetlands are generally poorly protected. Efforts to protect wetlands, given a set level of resources, could be improved by categorizing wetlands according to their relative importance and focusing existing wetland programs on high value wetlands.     

Quantitative assessment of tidal wetlands using remote sensing

Effective management of tidal wetlands requires periodic data on the boundaries, extent, and condition of the wetlands. In many states, wetlands are defined wholly, or in combination with other criteria, by the presence of particular emergent halophytic plants. Many important characteristics of the wetlands ecosystem are related directly to the production of emergent plant material or may be inferred from knowledge of the distribution of emergent plant species. Remote-sensing techniques have been applied to mapping of the distribution of wetland vegetation but not to quantitative evaluation of the condition of that vegetation.Recent research in the tidal wetlands of Delaware and elsewhere has shown that spectral canopy reflectance properties can be quantitatively related to the emergent green biomass ofSpartina alterniflora (salt marsh cord grass) throughout the peak growing season (April through September, in Delaware). Periodic measurements of this parameter could be applied to calculations of net aerial primary productivity for large areas ofS. alterniflora marsh in which conventional harvest techniques may be prohibitively time consuming. The method is species specific and, therefore, requires accurate discrimination ofS. alterniflora from other vegetation types. Observed seasonal changes in species spectral signatures are shown to have potential for improving multispectral categorization of tidal wetland vegetation types.     

基于3S技术的庄河市滨海湿地景观格局演变研究

庄河市位于黄海北部沿海地区,自然海岸线长达285km,拥有丰富的滨海湿地资源,对区域经济的发展具有显著的促进作用.以庄河市2000年和2010年的Landsat TM（或ETM）遥感影像获取研究区的滨海湿地斑块图形数据,选用生态意义较明确的景观特征指数,对庄河市滨海湿地的景观格局变化进行研究.研究结果表明,2000-2010年,庄河市滨海湿地总面积不断缩减,由2000年的131252.60hm2减少到2010年的121489.16hm2,减少幅度为7.44％;湿地斑块数不断增加,由2000年的3425块增加到2010年的3563块;湿地景观多样性指数（H）和景观形状指数（LSI）呈增加趋势,分别由2000年的0.6315和14.0分别增加到2010年的0.8554和18.7;景观优势度指数呈下降趋势,由2000年的0.8359下降到2010年的0.7364,表明庄河市滨海湿地的景观破碎化程度越来越严重.     

湿润区与干旱区典型湖泊湿地对比案例研究

选取东部湿润区与西北干早区典型湖泊湿地--洞庭湖湿地与艾比湖湿地,对其湿地资源特征、湿地生态服务功能及价值、湿地退化的表征和退化湿地生态恢复对策等方面进行了比较研究.通过研究发现,湿润区湖泊湿地资源禀赋优于干早区湖泊湿地,湿润区湖泊湿地与干旱区湖泊湿地均具有较强的生态服务功能和较高的价值,在湿地退化表征方面有共性也有差异,针对不同气候区域的退化湖泊湿地应采取不同的恢复对策.     

Freshwater wetlands human-induced changes: Indirect effects must also be considered

Two recent studies have documented changes in wetland ecosystems in New England by examining changes in wetland vegetation over time. Both documented shifts in vegetation towards shrub and forest dominated wetlands Both then concluded that natural succession has changed more wetlands than human impact has. The last conclusion does not necessarily follow from the data provided. There are three important points that emerge from re-considering these studies 1) indirect human impact (for example, water level changes, eutrophication, sedimentation) must be considered when assessing human impact on wetlands, particularly given that subtle indirect impact affects larger areas than direct impact from drainage and infilling, 2) when discussing indirect effects of human activity, it is important to carefully define which indirect effects are being considered, since there is a continuum ranging from infilling through to alteration of global CO₂ levels, and 3) given the complexity of indirect effects, it is unlikely that most can be recognized in the field.     

湿地综述与新疆湿地研究

湿地(Wetland)是世界上面积最大、分布地域最广泛、生产力最高的景观类型之一,其结构和功能十分独特,对全人类的发展发挥着独特的作用。我国是一个干旱缺水严重的国家,我国西部干旱区水资源与湿地问题突出,对湿地的研究应和"干旱区研究"并行。文中总结了国际与国内对湿地研究与发展状况和趋势,分析了新疆湿地的特征和类型,并提出了新疆湿地存在的问题和一些建议。     

Integrating objectives and scales for planning and implementing wetland restoration and creation in agricultural landscapes

Traditionally, wetland management strategies have focused on single familiar objectives, such as improving water quality, strengthening biodiversity, and providing flood control. Despite the relevant amount of studies focused on wetland creation or restoration with these and other objectives, still little is known on how to integrate objectives of wetland creation or restoration at different landscape scales. We have reviewed the literature to this aim, and based on the existing current knowledge, we propose a four step approach to take decisions in wetland creation or restoration planning. First, based on local needs and limitations we should elucidate what the wetland is needed for. Second, the scale at which wetland should be created or restored must be defined. Third, conflicts and compatibilities between creation or restoration objectives must then be carefully studied. Fourth, a creation or restoration strategy must be defined. The strategy can be either creating different unipurpose wetlands or multipurpose wetlands, or combinations of them at different landscape scales. In any case, in unipurpose wetland projects we recommend to pursue additional secondary objectives. Following these guidelines, restored and created wetlands would have more ecological functions, similar to natural wetlands, especially if spatial distribution in the landscape is considered. Restored and created wetlands could then provide an array of integrated environmental services adapted to local ecological and social needs.     

生态文明视域下河北沿海地区湿地农业发展转型研究

基于生态文明建设视域,分析了河北沿海地区湿地农业发展现状,指出目前存在天然湿地面积逐年减少、抵御自然灾害能力降低、水资源及环境条件恶化、湿地功能发挥受到限制等主要问题,阐释了湿地农业发展转型的必要性,提出实现湿地农业持续发展,必须推动其增长方式向依靠科学技术和科学管理转型,生产方式向依靠基础设施和技术装备转型,经营方式向适度规模经营转型,农产品向多品种、高品质转型,发展方式向多次产业融合转型。