Q&A: Restoring a wetland for clean water and wildlife

Q: What are wetlands and how common are they in Vermont?

Wetlands are what they sound like: natural places that are wet. There’re many kinds—forested, shrubby, or open. What unites them is water, from rain, runoff, groundwater, rivers, and streams. They cover 4–6% of Vermont today, but due to development, we’ve lost more than 35% of our wetlands since colonization

Q: Why does the loss of wetlands matter?

Wetlands hold floodwaters—minimizing the destruction of flooding. They store sediment and nutrients and prevent erosion, which helps keep water clean. For example, along the Otter Creek outside Middlebury lies a very large wetland area. A study found that during Tropical Storm Irene this area slowed floodwaters, reducing the damage to Middlebury by up to 78%. This is unique—not every town has giant wetlands upstream—but it does show their value. Many wetlands also store carbon. They’re hotspots of biological diversity, providing habitat for plants, animals, fungi, and microbes.

Wetlands are havens of biodiversity.

Q: Tell us about VLT’s wetland restoration program

We work with interested farmers to identify parts of their farm that might benefit from wetland restoration. When a project makes sense to everyone involved, we look for funding to compensate the farmer and do the work, and we develop a restoration plan.

Last year, we worked with a Sheldon farmer. A field had been drained years ago by a ditch, but it remained wet and was hard to use. We studied how water moves on the land, in the past and now, then restored wetland function in a way that matched the farmer’s needs. Then we broke up the ditch and dug depressions in the wettest part, so water would settle there instead of running straight into the river through an eroding channel. After, we planted trees and shrubs.

An excavator creates a depression in the field where a wetland had been filled in.

Q: How do you do these projects?

These are collaborative projects—many Vermont farmers are embracing water-quality work on their land, including restoring wetlands. In addition to willing landowners, we work with engineering firms, hydrologists, equipment operators, funders, organizations like the Missisquoi River Basin Association, volunteers, and wetland restoration experts.

After the initial work, we monitor water level, soil quality, wildlife, plants, and more, to see how the land is changing over time. At our first project, it’s been gratifying to see more diverse wildlife and new plants; this tells us we’ve created good habitat.