What is Marsh?

Information about Marsh

This article is about marsh, a type of wetland. For other uses of the word marsh, see Marsh (disambiguation).
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Freshwater marsh in Florida


In geography, a marsh, or morass, is a type of wetland which is subject to frequent or continuous inundation.[1] Typically a marsh features grasses, rushes, reeds, typhas, sedges, and other herbaceous plants (possibly with low-growing woody plants) in a context of shallow water. A marsh is different from a swamp, which has a greater proportion of open water surface, and is generally deeper than a marsh. In North America, the term swamp is used for wetland dominated by trees rather than grasses and low herbs.

The water of a marsh can be fresh, brackish or saline. Coastal marshes may be associated with estuaries and along waterways between coastal barrier islands and the inner coast. The estuarine marsh, or tidal marsh, is often based on soils consisting of sandy bottoms or bay muds. An example is the Tantramar Marsh of eastern Canada.

Below water decomposition processes often produce marsh gas, which may through self-ignition manifest as Will o' the wisps (aka. Jack-a-lanterns or spirites).

Marshes are critically important wildlife habitats, often serving as breeding grounds for a wide variety of animal life.

Constructed wetlands featuring surface-flow design are usually in the form of a marsh.

Images


Marsh in Point Pelee, Ontario, Canada

Marsh in Long Point, Ontario, Canada


See also

Reference line notes

External links

The word marsh has more than one meaning:
  • Marsh is a type of wetland.
  • Places called Marsh in England:
  • Marsh, Buckinghamshire

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Geography - (from the Greek words Geo (γη) or Gaea (γαία), both meaning "Earth", and graphein (γράφειν) meaning "to describe" or "to write"
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In physical geography, a wetland is an environment "at the interface between truly terrestrial ecosystems and aquatic systems making them inherently
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flood is an overflow of an expanse of water that submerges land, a deluge.[1] In the sense of "flowing water", the word is applied to the inflow of the tide, as opposed to the outflow or "ebb".
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Poaceae
(R.Br.) Barnhart

Subfamilies

There are 7 subfamilies:
Subfamily Arundinoideae
Subfamily Bambusoideae
Subfamily Centothecoideae
Subfamily Chloridoideae
Subfamily Panicoideae
Subfamily Pooideae
Subfamily Stipoideae


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Juncaceae
Juss.

Type genus
Juncus
L.

Genera
  • Andesia
  • Distichia
  • Juncus - Rush
  • Luzula - Woodrush
  • Marsippospermum
  • Oxychloë
  • Prionium

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Phragmites

Species: P. australis

Binomial name
Phragmites australis
(Cav.) Trin. ex Steud.
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Typhaceae
Juss.

Genus: Typha
L.

Species
See text

Typha is a genus of about eleven species of monocotyledonous flowering plants in the monogeneric family, Typhaceae.
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Cyperales is a botanical name for an order of flowering plants. As used in the Engler system (update, of 1964) and in the Wettstein system it consisted of only the single family.
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Plantae
Haeckel, 1866[1]

Divisions

Green algae
  • Chlorophyta
  • Charophyta
Land plants (embryophytes)
  • Non-vascular land plants (bryophytes)

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Water is a common chemical substance that is essential to all known forms of life.[1] In typical usage, water refers only to its liquid form or state, but the substance also has a solid state, ice, and a gaseous state, water vapor.
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worldwide view.
This article is about wetland type (a landform). For other uses of the term "swamp", see Swamp (disambiguation).
A swamp
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worldwide view of the subject.
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In physical geography, a wetland is an environment "at the interface between truly terrestrial ecosystems and aquatic systems making them inherently
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Herbs (IPA: hə(ɹ)b, or əɹb; see pronunciation differences) are seed-bearing plants without woody stems, which die down to the ground after flowering.
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Fresh Water is the debut album by Australian rock and blues singer Alison McCallum, released in 1972. Rare for an Australian artist at the time, it came in a gatefold sleeve.
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Brackish water (less commonly brack water) is water that is saltier than fresh water, but not as salty as seawater. It may result from mixing of seawater with fresh water, as in estuaries, or it may occur in brackish fossil aquifers.
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Salinity is the saltiness or dissolved salt content of a body of water. Salinity in Australian English and North American English may refer to salt in soil (see soil salination).

Definition


Water salinity
Fresh water Brackish water Saline water Brine
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estuary is a semi-enclosed coastal body of water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea.[1] Estuaries are often associated with high rates of biological productivity. An estuary is where the river meets the sea.
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coast is defined as the part of the land adjoining or near the ocean. A coastline is properly a line on a map indicating the disposition of a coast, but the word is often used to refer to the coast itself.
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shoal is a somewhat linear landform within or extending into a body of water, typically comprised of sand, silt or small pebbles. Alternatively termed sandbar or sandbank
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A tidal marsh is a type of marsh that is found along coasts and estuaries of which the flooding characteristics are determined by the tidal movement of the adjacent estuary, sea or ocean [1].
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Bay mud consists of thick deposits of soft, unconsolidated silty clay, which is saturated with water; these soil layers are situated at the bottom of certain estuaries, which are normally in temperate regions that have experienced cyclical glacial cycles.
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Tantramar Marshes are on the southern part of the Isthmus of Chignecto, which joins Nova Scotia to New Brunswick and the Canadian mainland.

The marshes penetrate inland from the Bay of Fundy for 10 kilometers.
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Methane is a chemical compound with the molecular formula CH4. It is the simplest alkane, and the principal component of natural gas. Methane's bond angles are 109.
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Self-ignition can refer either to
  • Spontaneous combustion or
  • the ability of Diesel fuel to ignite under high compression and the use of that phenomenon in Diesel engines

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The will-o'-the-wisp or ignis fatuus, or in plural form as ignes fatui ("fool's fire(s)") refers to the ghostly lights sometimes seen at night or twilight that hover over damp ground in still air — often over bogs.
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Habitat (which is Latin for "it inhabits") is the area where a particular species lives. It is essentially the natural environment in which an organism lives—at least the physical environment—that surrounds (influences and is utilized by) a species population.
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A constructed wetland is an artificial marsh or swamp, created for anthropogenic discharge such as wastewater, stormwater runoff or sewage treatment, and as habitat for wildlife, or for land reclamation after mining or other disturbance.
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