Managing Pymatuning swampland in northwestern Pennsylvania: A personal story

Abstract

P ymatuning Swamp lies buried beneath Pymatuning Reservoir, subdued but not forgotten, its legacy still visible in the hydric soils and wetlands of the reservoir backwaters (figure 1). This is a story of a changing climate, melting glaciers, ancient lakes filled with sediments, swamplands of northwestern Pennsylvania, and humanity's unceasing efforts to mold and manage the natural landscape for human uses. The footprint of the Adena culture, hunters and gatherers who grew corn ( Zea mays L.), beans, and squash 3,000 to 1,000 years ago near the wetlands, was light. Their settlements thrived for a short period along Pymatuning Creek, the Shenango River, and Conneaut Lake swamp. By the late 1700s, Europeans attempted to settle the wet, forested region incentivized by the Pennsylvania Land Act. The human solution to this wetland wilderness of abundant white pine ( Pinus strobus ), beaver ( Castor canadensis ), and wildlife that was nearly impenetrable to travel was to construct the Beaver to Erie Canal in the 1830s. This extension of the Erie Canal connected the Ohio River via Beaver River north to Shenango River, over the continental divide to Lake Erie and quickened the transport and exchange of the wilderness's raw materials and East Coast's dry goods. The Pymatuning…