Maintain and restore floodplain connectivity

Floodplains, wetlands, lowland forests, and riparian vegetation are critical water storage areas that also enhance local water quality by filtering pollutants, and sediments. Floodplain systems reduce the magnitude of flood events by physically slowing water velocity as it overtops channel banks, a process that regulates downstream water quantity and streamflow velocity. Additionally, this regulation may improve base flow conditions that can buffer forested ecosystems during droughts. Higher peak flows and longer dry periods are both occurring as the climate changes, potentially increasing the importance of maintaining and restoring floodplain connectivity to stream networks.

This strategy seeks to sustain fundamental watershed functions, addressing the maintenance of and restoration of soil-water connections and hydrologic function. A shift in climate may amplify and exacerbate existing ecosystem challenges resulting from land-uses that have fragmented, altered or obstructed water flow pathways. Sustaining hydrologic and ecosystem functions into the future is likely to depend on management planning that seeks to maintain the long-term conveyance of water through unobstructed hydrologic pathways, most notably actions that promote the enhancement of water infiltration by porous forest soils.