What is a Watershed?

A watershed is an area of land that water flows over or under on its way to a stream, river, lake or other body of water.

Everyone lives in a watershed and everyone affects the water quality in a watershed. In Mahoning County we have six major watersheds and each of them covers several thousand acres. (One acre is approximately the size of a football field.) Since a watershed is a natural land area and not a human made boundary a single township may affect several watersheds or a single watershed may include parts of several townships or municipalities.

The land use in each watershed is extremely important. It is the way the land within a watershed is used that directly affects the water quality. You can imagine that a watershed whose sole land use is wilderness areas will have fewer factors impact its water quality than one that supports a city or industrial site.

Though every piece of land in the watershed is important in determining water quality, none is more so than the riparian area. The riparian area is the land touching and immediately surrounding a stream, river, lake or other body of water. The riparian area usually consists of three elements:

• The stream channel


• The flood plain


• Some of the upland area near the stream

Did you know that riparian areas range in size from a few feet on either side of the stream to several miles wide? Riparian areas vary widely in not only size, but also in appearance from stream to stream and in different parts of the country. Because of differences in climate, topography and other factors, riparian areas take on different appearances in different regions of the country. A riparian area here in northeast Ohio would look very unlike one in Arizona or even in West Virginia!