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Definition: swamp from Processing Water, Wastewater, Residuals, and Excreta for Health and Environmental Protection: An Encyclopedic Dictionary

A type of wetland dominated by woody vegetation but without appreciable peat deposits. Swamp water contains decaying vegetation with resulting high levels of taste, odor, and color. Swamps may be fresh or saltwater, and tidal or nontidal. They are created on flat lands by rainwater accumulation or river overflows, in sluggish streams by backwater, or by seepage outcrops over an impervious formation. The word is often used to include areas with nonwoody vegetation, e.g., marshes, bogs, etc.


swamp

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
shallow body of water in a low-lying, poorly drained depression, usually containing abundant plant growth dominated by trees, such as cypress, and high shrubs. Swamps develop in moist climates, generally in such places as low-lying coastal plains, floodplains of rivers, and old lake basins or in areas where normal drainage has been disrupted by glacial deposits. In the United States, swamps cover approximately 100,000 sq mi (260,000 sq km), most of them occurring as small swamps in northeastern states that were covered with glaciers in the past. The most extensive swamps are found along the Atlantic and Gulf coastal plains, notable examples being the Everglades of S Florida, Great Dismal Swamp of Virginia, and Okefenokee Swamp of Georgia and N Florida. Because the bottom of a swamp is at or below the water table, swamps serve to channel runoff into the groundwater supply, thus helping to stabilize the water table. During periods of very heavy rains, a swamp can act as a natural flood…
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Full text Article swamp

From The Chambers Dictionary
a tract of wet, spongy (in the USA often tree-clad) land; low waterlogged ground. vt to cause to sink or become stuck in a swamp (also fig ); to cause (eg a boat) to fill with water; to overwhelm, inundate. vi to become swamped. adj of, or of the nature of, swamp; living or growing in swamps. [Perh…
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Full text Article swamp

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
shallow body of water in a low-lying, poorly drained depression, usually containing abundant plant growth dominated by trees, such as cypress, and high shrubs. Swamps develop in moist climates, generally in such places as low-lying coastal plains, floodplains of rivers, and old lake basins or in…
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Full text Article Swamp, Jake

From Encyclopedia of the American Indian in the Twentieth Century
Also known as: Tekaronianeken (b. 1941–d. 2010) Mohawk tribal chief, Iroquois spokesperson Born on October 18, 1941, on the Akwesasne Reservation in northern New York State, Jake Swamp was given the name Tekaronianeken. Although raised a Catholic, Swamp was influenced as a youth by the traditional…
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Full text Article mangrove swamp

From Science Encyclopedia: Encyclopedia of Marine Science
Mangroves, with their extensive roots, are...
Mangrove swamps or forests are coastal wetlands found along the world's tropical and subtropical low-energy shorelines that are dominated by perennial mangrove trees. These evergreen trees are tolerant of the brackish waters common to estuaries and saltier waters found along the shores of the…
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Full text Article swamp

From The American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language
a. An area of low-lying land that is frequently flooded, especially one dominated by woody plants. b. A lowland region saturated with water. A situation or place fraught with difficulties and imponderables: a financial swamp. v. swamped, swamp•ing, swamps v. tr. To drench in or cover with or as if…
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Full text Article swamp

From Collins English Dictionary
n 1 a permanently waterlogged ground that is usually overgrown and sometimes partly forested Compare marsh b ( as modifier ): swamp fever ▷ vb 2 to drench or submerge or be drenched or submerged 3 nautical to cause (a boat) to sink or fill with water or (of a boat) to sink or fill with water 4 to…
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Full text Article Great Dismal Swamp

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
SE Va. and NE N.C. With dense forests and tangled undergrowth, the wetlands are a favorite site for sportsmen and naturalists. It once may have covered nearly 2,200 sq mi (5,700 sq km) but has been reduced by drainage to less than 600 sq mi (1,550 sq km). The swamp bottom is composed of organic…
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Full text Article Indochina's Vicious Swamp Demons

From The Werewolf Book: The Encyclopedia of Shape-Shifting Beings
The following account is most intriguing. As medical doctors and psychiatrists have discovered, some individuals who suffer from lycanthropy have contracted the condition after a violent physical and/or mental shock. Often, the individual recovering from temporary lycanthropy, having been…
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Full text Article FAMILY SYNBRANCHIDAE—SWAMP EELS

From Princeton Field Guides: Field Guide to the Fishes of the Amazon, Orinoco, and Guianas Full text Article THE FISH FAMILIES
FAMILY SYNBRANCHIDAE—SWAMP EELS
— PETER VAN DER SLEEN and JAMES S. ALBERT Family includes 23 species in four genera worldwide, and is found throughout the tropics and subtropics in fresh and occasionally brackish water. Three species in a single genus in the AOG region. Synbranchus (100–150 cm TL) Completely lacking pectoral, …
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Full text Article Okefenokee Swamp

From Britannica Concise Encyclopedia
Swamp and wildlife refuge, southeastern Georgia and northeastern Florida, U.S. It has an area of more than 600 sq mi (1,550 sq km). Located about 50 mi (80 km) inland from the Atlantic coast, it is bounded by the low, sandy Trail Ridge, which prevents direct drainage into the Atlantic. It…
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