1. By Steven Gilio

2.  Found on the coastal plains of the southeastern United States from Virginia to Florida.  Most common in North Carolina (70%).

3.  Occupy poorly drained higher ground between streams and floodplains. Pocosin is an Algonquin Indian word that means “swamp on a hill”.  Range in size from less than an acre to several thousand acres.

4.  Pocosins will often be found on top of perched water tables

5.  Deep, acidic, sandy, peat soils  Dense evergreen plant communities, which thrive on acidic, nutrient-poor soils.  No standing water present.  Shallow water table leaves the soil saturated for much of the year.

6.  Pocosins are pyrophitic ecosystems.  Natural fires occur because pocosins periodically become very dry in the spring or summer.  Fires are ecologically important because they Increase the diversity of shrub types in pocosins.

7. Tall Pocosins  Taller trees  Shallow peat  More soil nutrients Short Pocosins  Shorter trees  Deeper peat  Less soil nutrients

8.  Essential to the healthy functioning of estuaries along the Southeastern U.S. coastline.  Good at absorbing and retaining rainfall, which is then released slowly into nearby streams and saltwater marshes.  Valuable for storm water retention and groundwater recharge.  Provides specialized habitat

9. Pond PineLoblolly PineLongleaf Pine

10. Titi Tree Fetterbush Zenobia

11. Sphagnum MossVenus Fly Trap

12. Black Bear Red Wolf Red-Cockaded Woodpecker

13.  Agriculture More than 3,000 square miles were drained between 1962 and 1979. About 1,400 square miles of undisturbed pocosins Remain today  Timber harvest  Peat mining  Phosphate mining

15. http://www.nhptv.org/wild/pocosins.asp http://www.iwla.org/publications/enews/ ss/v1_iss5.htm http://www.eoearth.org/article/Pocosins http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocosin