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Large areas of swamps in Cambodia are being destroyed by Cambodia's economy with devitasting effects on its people and wildlife. A third of the population no longer have access to clean water. The number of sarus cranes in Cambodia has dropped to less than 250.

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Bogs generally form in places where glaciers once dug into the Earth’s surface. The glaciers left holes that filled with water and eventually formed bogs.

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A fen is a type of peat-accumulating wetland fed by mineral-rich ground or surface water.[1][2] It is one of the main types of wetlands along with marshes, swamps, and bogs. Bogs and fens, both peat-forming ecosystems, are also known as mires.[2] The unique water chemistry of fens is a result of the ground or surface water input. Typically, this input results in higher mineral concentrations and a more basic pH than found in bogs. As peat accumulates in a fen, groundwater input can be reduced or cut off, making the fen ombrotrophic rather than minerotrophic. In this way, fens can become more acidic and transition to bogs over time.[2]

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Joe-Pye weed (Eupatorium maculatum)

Horsetail (Equisetum hyemale)

Corkscrew rush (Juncus effusus)

Northern blue flag (Iris versicolor)

Papyrus (Cyperus papyrus)

Marsh marigold (Caltha palustris)

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Plant life is limited in a bog because of the lack of minerals in the soil. Mosses and heaths are the main plants. Layers of dead plants build up in bogs to form a material called peat. Dried peat is burned for fuel. A sphagnum moss, the dominant plant, absorbs many of the already scarce minerals from the water and replaces them with acid. It also slows the passage of air into the water. This combination of lack of oxygen, high acidity, and lack of minerals slows the natural decomposition of plant materials.

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Animals like mink, raccoons, opossums, muskrats, beavers, frogs, turtles and lots of species of birds and insects are common in marsh lands. Freshwater marshes can vary in size from very small to very large!

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 What can you say about the water in Marsh?

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 What can you say about the water in Marsh?

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There are different types of water in Marsh from freshwater to saltwater.

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Sedges and Shrubby Cinquefoil live in Fens

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Turkeys, snakes, deers, butterflies, turtles, fish all live in fens

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Cattails (Typha) and common reeds (Phragmites) are familiar swamp species around the world.

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Freshwater wetlands cover more than 30% of the land area

The population has grown from under 9M in 1990 to over 16M today

Rapid annual GDP growth rate (6.9% last year), but unchecked development leading to collapse of wetlands and ecosystem services

90% of the 4.8 M impoverished Cambodian people live in rural areas with heavy reliance on ecosystem services

Half of its seasonally flooded grasslands lost in ten years!

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Reasons why we should protect the swamps/wetlands!

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Reasons why we should protect the swamps/wetlands!

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1.Wetlands are great filters! They trap sediments and remove pollutants, which helps to purify water. This certainly beats expensive, human-made filtration systems.

2.Wetlands are great filters! They trap sediments and remove pollutants, which helps to purify water. This certainly beats expensive, human-made filtration systems.

3.When rivers burst their banks, wetlands can store the excess water, and slow it down so it distributes more evenly over a floodplain. The roots of trees and other vegetation also help slow the speed of flood waters.

4.When rivers burst their banks, wetlands can store the excess water, and slow it down so it distributes more evenly over a floodplain. The roots of trees and other vegetation also help slow the speed of flood waters.

5.Sediments are also trapped by wetlands. In a semi-arid country like South Africa, the role of wetlands in trapping sediments, before the sediment-laden water joins a river course and just washes away, is really useful.

6.Fish larvae and fish fry (juveniles) use the calm, shallow waters of wetlands as a nursery.

7.Biodiversity is high around wetlands habitats. These areas provide food and shelter for many animals, in particular bird species such as herons, spoonbills and flamingos, and amphibians such as frogs.

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Wildlife is not common though there may be some insect-eating plants and orchids.

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Animals like white-tailed deer, minks, raccoons, pileated woodpeckers, purple gallinules, egrets, herons, alligators, frogs, turtles, and snakes are often found in cypress swamps.

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Bogs generally begin as a small body of water with a floating mat of vegetation next to the shore. This mat develops into a floating bog mat of mosses and heaths, which thickens and grows toward the center of the water. Bits from the bottom of the mat sink to the lake bottom so that the lake is filled from both the bottom up and the top down.

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What can you say about the water in that wetland?

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What can you say about the water in that wetland?

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The unique water chemistry of fens is a result of the ground or surface water input.

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Marsh grasses move with waves near Smith Island, Maryland. Marshes are a type of wetland ecosystem where water covers the ground for long periods of time. Marshes are dominated by herbaceous plants, such as grasses, reeds, and sedges.

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Swamps and marshes have mineral soils, however, while bogs have spongy, peaty soil that contains almost no minerals. Consequently, bog plant life consists of simple plants that can subsist on less nourishing soil—mosses, sedges, and reeds, for example.

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A swamp is part of a wetland ecosystem.

Swamps are forested, low, spongy land generally saturated with water and covered with trees and aquatic plants.

They can be found on all continents except Antarctica.

Swamps form around lakes, rivers and streams. Rain and seasonal flooding cause water levels to fluctuate. In the wet soil, water-tolerant vegetation grows and helps maintain a moist, swampy condition.

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Fens are valuable to humans as well. They are important as sites of groundwater discharge and are good indicators of shallow aquifers. Vegetation in all wetlands plays an important role in recycling nutrients, trapping eroding soil, and filtering out polluting chemicals such as nitrates.

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Conserving salt marsh helps people, too. Marshes can reduce erosion, stabilize shorelines, protect against storm surge, and support species that are crucial to recreational and commercial fishing, hunting, birding, and other activities

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this is salt marsh

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Why is it important to protect this type of wetland?

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Why is it important to protect this type of wetland?

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Fens, like bogs, provide important benefits in a watershed, including preventing or reducing the risk of floods, improving water quality, and providing habitat for unique plant and animal communities.