Langdon Park - Plymouth, NH one of NH's finest examples of a floodplain forest where environmental and community interests blend to protect a beautiful forest and to provide for the recreational needs of the community.
Image: Wayne D. King
Floodplain forests - once abundant along river corridors - now account for less than two percent of New Hampshire. The Nature Conservancy and the US Army Corps of Engineers have announced that they will be conducting a study of these unique forests to learn how to protect them while still safeguarding cities and towns from floods.
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Listen to a radio piece from NH Public Radio
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Floodplain Forests represent a very unique ecological niche in New Hampshire. The mix of species varies in different regions of the state but all share some unique characteristics associated with the flooding, scouring and draining that takes place every year in them.
In the central NH area they are represented by canopies of large trees, often silver maples which are rarely found anywhere else in the hardwood forests of the region. Huge ostrich ferns, sensitive ferns and interrupted ferns creating a lush carpet along the forest floor, interspersed with streams, oxbows, and wallows.
According to Kimberly Lutz, director of The Nature Conservancy's Connecticut River Program, "Floodplain forests are an important biological community and we know very little about them.
We know that dams and other alterations of river flow can harm floodplain forests. We know that they are threatened by conversion to development and agriculture. And we know that floodplain forests can actually help alleviate floods' damaging effects on communities by holding high water and easing the impact of flooding."But we know little about their dynamics -- like the volume, duration and timing of high-water events that enables them to survive. There have been studies of trees and other plant life in floodplain forests. And there have been other studies of elevational profiles and flow modeling. But there have been no studies that combine the two in a comprehensive way.
That's where the Nature Conservancy's study comes in. Over the next two years Christian Marks of the Conservancy and his crew will be lead an ambitious field study of floodplain forests throughout the entire Connecticut River watershed, looking at the effects of flow and elevation on trees and other flora.Links
A Question of Flow for Floodplain Forests
Framed by enormous, towering silver maples, Christian Marks walks waist-deep in ferns, spreading out a foot of yellow measuring tape with each step
The Nature Conservancy's Floodplain Forest Project
The Sustainable Rivers Project -- A partnership of The Nature Conservancy and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Partnership in Action
The future of many American rivers rests with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, empowered by Congress to manage the nation’s waterways. As the largest water manager and hydropower producer in the United States, the Corps owns more than 600 dams, controls levees and administers river locks that allow for navigation, making it an essential partner in the Conservancy's goal to achieve lasting river conservation in the United States.
In 2002, the Conservancy and the Corps launched a historic partnership to find new ways of conserving and protecting freshwater habitats while meeting human needs for water. Named the Sustainable Rivers Project, it is an important example of the Conservancy’s freshwater conservation work. Sustainable Rivers promotes innovative water management practices through work at demonstration sites, staff exchanges and software development. A focal challenge in the partnership is finding ways to manage floods so that key ecological processes, such as fish spawning and forest regeneration, can persist, while human settlements are protected.
Video
A Natural Focus: Floodplain
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Fawn Among the Ferns
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