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Basic Chemical Hazards to Wildlife
Published in Jack Daugherty, Assessment of Chemical Exposures, 2020
Freshwater marshes provide nesting and wintering habitats for waterfowl, shore-birds, muskrats, frogs, and aquatic insects. Salt marshes are wintering grounds for snow geese and ducks, a nesting habitat for herons and rails, and a source of nutrients for estaurine waters. Marshes are important in flood control, in sustaining high-water tables, and as settling basins to reduce pollution downstream. Despite their great environmental value, marshes are continually being destroyed by drainage and filling. A slough is a swamp, shallow lake system, a slowly flowing swamp, or marsh.
Florida Everglades and Restoration
Published in Caiyun Zhang, Multi-sensor System Applications in the Everglades Ecosystem, 2020
Sloughs are channels of free-flowing water between the sawgrass marshes and play important roles to deliver fresh water to bays and estuaries, a function like rivers and canals in the Everglades (Figure 1.9). However, flow in sloughs is slower than in a river. Sloughs are deeper than sawgrass marshes and stay flooded for at least 11 months out of the year if not multiple years in a row. The peat beds that support sawgrass are slightly elevated and may begin abruptly creating ridges of grass. The elevated sawgrass lands and deep sloughs between the borders are called the “ridge-and-slough” landscape in the Everglades. The “ridge-and-slough” once was the major landscape in the Everglades (Figure 1.2(a)), but only three major sloughs remain, including Lostmans Slough bordering the Big Cypress Preservation, Shark River Slough draining to Gulf of Mexico, and Taylor Slough located on the east side of the southern Everglades draining water to Florida Bay (Figure 1.8). In the pristine state, soil surface of ridges is 2 to 3 feet higher than that of the sloughs. Despite the elevation difference between ridges and sloughs, ridges are also covered with water for most of the year. Ridges can dry out entirely during the dry season. Tree islands are a third element in the “ridge-and-slough” landscape. They are higher in elevation than ridges and tend to expose soil except during periods of unusually high water (Figures 1.10 and 1.11). A diverse assemblage of plants, animals, and microorganisms is found in the sloughs. Plants are usually submerged or floating such as bladderwort, waterlily, and spatterdock. Aquatic animals such as turtles, young alligators, snakes, and fish live in sloughs, and they usually feed on aquatic invertebrates. Periphyton, an assemblage of algae, and other microorganisms, also thrive in sloughs. Periphyton often forms dense calcareous mats several inches thick that are attached to the bottom or to vascular plants. Because of its concentration of microorganisms, which require oxygen and other nutrients, periphyton has a pronounced effect on water quality. 5) Pine forests
Socio-hydrology and vulnerability of levee systems along the lower Illinois River
Published in Annals of GIS, 2023
Ali Rashed Alruzuq, Jonathan W.F. Remo, Joann Mossa, Kevin Ash
As of the 2010 census, ~10,300 people were inhabiting flood-prone areas protected by the 29 LIR levee systems evaluated in this study. The overwhelming majority (97%) of the population lived within levees with an acceptable levee safety rating. The majority (59%) of these levee-protected floodplain inhabitants are between the ages of 16 and 64, they are nearly evenly split between males (51%) and females (49%), and the overwhelming majority (74%) are white. Nearly all of the non-white population (98%) lived within Sid Simpson Levee System that protects the region’s largest economic and population centre, the City of Beardstown, which had an acceptable levee safety rating. The levee system with the highest average per-capita income was Clear Lake Special and Hanger Slough Levee System ($83,500). The lowest per-capita income was Valley City Drainage and Levee District ($48,500). Nearly all (99%) of the household with an income below the poverty line in Illinois (<$40,000) resided in levee systems with an acceptable levee rating. However, the per capita income was ~6% higher in levee systems with an unacceptable levee safety rating (Table 2; Figures 4, 5, 6, and 7).
Nitrate pollution and expansion of free-floating plants in 3 lower Wisconsin River oxbow lakes
Published in Lake and Reservoir Management, 2023
David W. Marshall, Kenneth Wade, Jean L. Unmuth
More than 100 oxbow lakes lie within the 148 km LWSR floodplain. We focused on 4 of the lakes located in Sauk County, where previous groundwater modeling (Gotkowitz et al. 2005, Pfeiffer et al. 2006) enhanced our understanding of oxbow hydrology. Jones Slough is a 3 ha spring lake that discharges to Norton Slough. Norton Slough is a 5.5 ha drainage lake and is also influenced by upgradient groundwater discharge. Bakkens Flowage was a spring lake, expanded into 35 ha impoundment for waterfowl management. It is located within a State Natural Area. Long Lake is a 13.3 ha drainage lake downstream of Bakkens Flowage. Long Lake did not shift to FFP dominance as occurred in the other 3 study oxbow lakes. All 4 oxbow lakes lie downgradient from Pleistocene sand terrace croplands (Fig. 2). All of the oxbow lakes are shallow with maximum depths of about 2.5 m.