Pasture wetlands help filter runoff

Source: Visalia Times-Delta
January 29, 2008

What a relief! Researchers at the University of California have found that wetlands have some benefits for the farmers and ranchers on whose land they reside.

The finding comes after two decades of incessant drumming by environmentalists claiming that something good can come from the bogs and swamps that dot the land. Endless regulations to protect and preserve them have been developed, particularly at the federal level. Even with the stimulating news that the overgrown puddles provide more than shelter for weeds, frogs, salamanders, mosquitoes, algae and several other insects and assorted wildlife many farmers with unsightly year-around mud holes are still likely to think of them as unproductive nuisances.

But the researchers have found that levels of E. coli, for example, in streams draining some of California's range country are reduced by an average of 74 percent when they run through a wetland. In other words, the bacteria level of water draining out of a wetland is lower than it is in the stream that feeds it. Before encountering the wetland a typical stream is likely to pick up any number of bacteria from cattle, wild animal and bird feces or other sources along its meandering way.

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