United States
On March 22, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) released its sixth edition of the “Wetlands Status and Trends” report to Congress. The report, Status and Trends of Wetlands in the Conterminous United States 2009-2019, reveals that wetlands – 95 percent of which are freshwater — covered less than 6 percent of the lower 48 states as of 2019 – which is half the area they covered in the 1780s. The report also identifies that loss rates have increased by 50 percent since 2009 and that without additional conservation actions taken to protect these ecosystems, wetland loss will likely continue, reducing ecosystem benefits for people and habitat for fish, wildlife and plants. Report authors will share highlights from the report, including the methods used to collect and interpret wetland data, drivers of change, and the report’s conclusions and Storymap.
Megan Lang is Chief Scientist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service National Wetlands Inventory Program and Project Lead for the Wetlands Status and Trends study. She is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Maryland Department of Geographical Sciences and serves as an Associate Editor for the journal Wetlands. Dr. Lang has been working to improve the assessment of aquatic ecosystems through field and remote sensing studies for over two decades. Before working for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, she led the U.S. Department of Agricultural Mid-Atlantic Regional Wetland Conservation Effects Assessment Project.
Jeff Ingebritsen is a GIS Specialist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's National Wetlands Inventory since 2013. He serves as the data manager for the Wetlands Status and Trends study. In addition to Status and Trends, Jeff works on various cartography, spatial analysis, and scripting projects for NWI. Jeff lives with his family in southern Wisconsin, where he enjoys gardening, cooking, and making music.