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Why do wetlands often support more biodiversity than nearby ecosystems?

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Bald cypress trees with wide, flared trunks stand in still, shallow water in a Louisiana swamp, their green foliage creating a dense canopy. — Wetland Stately bald cypresses (*Taxodium distichum*) thriving in a Louisiana swamp.

Wetlands often support higher biodiversity than adjacent ecosystems because they function as ecotones—transitional zones between terrestrial and aquatic environments.12

This positioning allows wetlands to provide essential habitat and food sources for both land-based and water-dwelling species. Through the edge effect, these transitional areas often contain a greater number of species and higher organism densities than either of the bordering communities alone, as they offer unique conditions for activities such as foraging, nesting, and courtship.12

By combining the attributes of both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, wetlands create complex environments that support specialized assemblages of plants, animals, and microbes adapted to saturated, low-oxygen soils. Because of this ecological richness, wetlands are vital to the biosphere and frequently serve as critical refuges for rare and endangered species. Given their immense ecological value, it is a moral imperative to prioritize the conservation and restoration of these productive systems rather than degrading them for immediate economic gain.13