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Wetland Connectivity: Introduction and Relevance to Texas Coastal Plain Depressional Wetlands
Citation:
Leibowitz, S. AND M. Rains. Wetland Connectivity: Introduction and Relevance to Texas Coastal Plain Depressional Wetlands. Society of Wetland Scientists, Corpus Christi, TX, May 31 - June 04, 2016.
Impact/Purpose:
Hydrologists and ecologists have been interested in connectivity between systems for decades. More recently, the question of whether and how wetlands connect to downstream waters has taken on greater significance. This is due to the US Supreme Court’s 2006 Rapanos decision and the 2015 Clean Water Rule, which require certain wetlands to have a “significant nexus” with navigable waters if the wetlands are to qualify as waters of the US. As a result of this attention, a symposium entitled “Depressional Wetlands of the Texas Coastal Plain-Connectivity, Ecosystem Services, Protection, and Restoration” has been organized as part of the 2016 Annual Meeting of the Society of Wetland Scientists. Because of the senior author’s role in EPA’s 2015 Connectivity report, the chair of the session (who works at EPA Region 6) invited him to give the symposium’s opening presentation in order to review the state-of-the-science on wetland connectivity. This presentation is based on the earlier Connectivity report, and does not contribute to any current deliverable.
Description:
Hydrologists and ecologists have been interested in connectivity between systems for decades. More recently, the question of whether and how wetlands connect to downstream waters has taken on greater significance. This is due to the US Supreme Court’s 2006 Rapanos decision and the 2015 Clean Water Rule, which require certain wetlands to have a “significant nexus” with navigable waters if the wetlands are to qualify as waters of the US. In this presentation, we provide an overview of the scientific and technical aspects of the wetland connectivity issue. We summarize the findings of EPA’s Connectivity report, which was the technical basis for the Clean Water Rule. The EPA report conducted a review and synthesis of over 1,200 peer-reviewed publications. We describe the report’s conceptual framework for connectivity, and summarize the major conclusions with respect to two separate groups of wetlands. Next, we discuss findings from several recent papers that were published subsequent to the EPA report. Finally, we describe some connectivity issues specific to Texas Coastal Plain Depressional Wetlands, and conclude by outlining remaining research issues.