Category Archives: weather

Drying Out South Georgia Wetlands in Dirty Dozen by Georgia Water Coalition

We’re on Georgia Water Coalition’s Dirty Dozen 2011: as 9. South Georgia Wetlands: Four Decades of Ditches Dry Out South Georgia Wetlands:

Since the 1970s, state and federal regulatory agencies have allowed the destruction of more than 200,000 acres of highly critical wetlands throughout South Georgia to increase timber production and agricultural yields and usher in residential and commercial development. These wetlands that captured water and slowly released it to streams no longer perform that important function. The result has been increased floods when it rains and record low flows when it doesn’t….

Flooding? Like the 700 year flood in Lowndes County 3 years ago today?

What’s a wetland, anyway?

the greatest concentration of wetlands is in the Coastal Plain of South Georgia. Though these forested foodplains and wetlands may not seem directly linked to our rivers and streams, they play an important role in holding water during rain events and dispensing it during dry periods. The sponges and kidneys of our state, they mitigate major floods, lessen the impacts of drought, and clean the water that passes through them, while regulating the amount of freshwater entering Georgia’s coastal estuaries where commercially important seafood find critical habitat. Additionally, these wetlands provide important habitat for waterfowl and other wildlife.

So what’s the problem?

In an effort to convert these wild lands into
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Happy frogs in the cypress swamp 2012-03-07

It rained six inches here when the tornado went through. That rain refilled the cypress swamp, and revived thousands of frogs that had been slumbering in the mud.

Panning around their habitat, you can’t see them, but you can hear them.

Here’s a playlist: Continue reading →

Clear-cutting led to flood disaster

Alex J. Chepstow-Lusty talks about a tree from Peru, “huarango, a tree that lives in highly arid zones and stabilizes the soil with some of the deepest roots of any tree known-and can live up to 1000 years”:
“At the bottom of the profile, I found lots of huarango pollen. This indicates that large forests were originally growing in that area.

Subsequently, I saw cotton pollen and other weeds, but still a lot of huarango pollen. It seems at this stage farming was in balance with the environment,” Chepstow-Lusty said.

Then, about 400 A.D., the Nazca apparently stopped growing cotton, switching to large crops of maize.

The researchers found a major reduction of huarango pollen, indicating that people started clearing the forests to plant more crops.

But the agricultural gain from clearing forests was short-lived. When a mega El Nino event hit the south coast of Peru in about 500 A.D., there were no huarango roots to anchor the landscape.

The fields and canal systems were washed away, leaving a desert environment. Today, only pollen from plants adapted to salty and arid conditions can be found, Chepstow-Lusty said.

“The bottom line is that the Nazca could have survived the devastating El Nino floods had they kept their forests alive. Basically, the huarango trees would have cushioned that major event,” Beresford-Jones said.

Hm, around here we’ve only seen a 700-year flood last year. When it happens again in a year or so, what will we call it?