45 S U P P LY O F O U T D O O R R E C R E AT I O N
Did you know?
At the time of statehood in 1867, Nebraska contained an estimated
2,910,000 acres of wetlands. Wetlands have been affected directly by
filling, ditching, tilling, digging concentration pits, channelization, and
declining water tables, and indirectly by changes in the surrounding
uplands that caused increased sedimentation or the diversion of
surface runoff away from wetlands. Wetlands and water areas also
were created in some regions due to the construction of farm and
livestock ponds, and locally rising water tables due to irrigation canal
and reservoir seepage. However, the net result of all of these activities
statewide was a reduction in wetlands by an estimated 35 percent, to
1,905,000 acres. The destruction of wetlands was much higher in some
regions of the state, reaching over a 90 percent loss, but the statewide
figure is buffered by the large wetland resource still remaining in
the Sandhills.
Over the past 250 years, wetlands have declined at
an alarming rate, mostly due to land conversion.
!
Only half
the world's
wetlands
remain intact.
Today, only
65% of
Nebraska's
wetlands
remain intact.
Approximately
10% of the Nebraska
Rainwater Basin
playa wetlands
remain intact.
Storm clouds loom over a wetland in the Sandhills on the Valentine National Wildlife Refuge. (Cherry County)
Figure 3.4: Wetland Loss
