Disentangling the effects of wetland loss and urban development on the quality of remaining wetlands.

摘要

The relative effects of wetland loss and urbanization on the quality of remaining wetlands is poorly understood due to correlations between these landscape variables. My main objective was to determine the relative effects of wetland loss and urbanization on wetland quality. I accomplished this by selecting a set of wetlands for which amount of surrounding wetland cover and impervious cover were uncorrelated, at multiple spatial extents. Wetland quality was inferred through vegetation and benthic macroinvertebrate abundance and taxa richness. I found that wetland loss is more detrimental than urbanization to remaining wetland quality. My results indicate that policies aimed at reducing the impacts of urbanization surrounding wetlands will only partly be successful. Wetland management policies should also include wetland restoration in the landscape.