Wetland reality

It is a harsh fact that the most vibrant and vital ecological areas are the most vulnerable. Pollution and development have already wiped out the diversity and habitat opportunities of most of western Washington’s river deltas, and it’s hard to see how the same fate won’t take the rest. The Nisqually delta in south Puget Sound, for example, is often held up as an example of successful preservation. Which it is.

What sets the Nisqually Reach apart from all the others, however, is simply that it is the only river delta left in Puget Sound that bears any resemblence to the way that it used to be. All of the others once looked wild and green as well, and now they are gone forever. Cocooned in concrete like the Duwamish and the Puyallup, channelized and controlled with dikes and canals, they have become home to commerce and waste, and their previous inhabitants have been rplaced with floating garbage and an oily sheen on the water. The mouth of the Nisqually exists today as a reminder of what was once the norm, the way it was meant to be.

The rivers of the Olympic peninsula have not been subjected to the same pressures that have decimated those in Puget Sound. Not yet, anyway. The Dosewallips delta still has a healthy exchange of fresh and salt water where multiple species of plant, bird and animal can find food and shelter. It’s getting harder to maintain, with the press of development moving closer every day, but it’s still there. It’s hard to say how long it will stay this way.

When I look at the mud and the delicately intertwining passages of the Dosewallips, I see a part of the natural world that is as beautiful and fascinating as any other on the planet. Unfortunately there are others, with more money and ambition than I, who look at it and see a golf course.