Growing your results…
Wetlands cover less than 6% of the contiguous United States — roughly half the area they occupied before European settlement, according to the most recent Wetlands Status and Trends report published by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2024. Between 2009 and 2019 alone, 670,000 acres of vegetated wetlands disappeared — an area larger than Rhode Island.
Yet despite that small and shrinking footprint, wetlands support extraordinary ecological weight. An estimated 40% of all plant and animal species in North America live or breed in wetland habitats. Nearly half of all species listed under the Endangered Species Act are wetland-dependent. More than 4 billion birds from Canada use wetlands as stopover or wintering habitat each year.
That outsized impact comes down to the plants. Wetland vegetation isn't incidental to these ecosystems — it is the ecosystem. The right species filter water, sequester carbon, stabilize shorelines, and anchor food webs from the ground up.
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The term "nature's water filter" gets used loosely, but the mechanisms are specific and well-documented.
Root uptake of nitrogen and phosphorus. Wetland plants absorb inorganic nitrogen (nitrate, ammonia) and phosphorus (soluble reactive phosphate) through their root systems during the growing season, incorporating these nutrients into plant tissue. Research compiled in a 2025 review published in the Journal of Materials and Environmental Science found that constructed wetlands remove 60–90% of excess nitrogen and phosphorus from agricultural and stormwater runoff — at a fraction of the cost of conventional treatment infrastructure.
Denitrification via microbial biofilms. For nitrogen, the dominant sustainable removal pathway isn't plant uptake — it's denitrification, a process carried out by bacteria that live on wetland plant roots and stems. These bacteria convert dissolved nitrates back into harmless nitrogen gas, permanently removing nitrogen from the water cycle. Critically, wetland plants supply the carbon these bacteria need to function. Remove the plants, and the denitrification system collapses.
Soil carbon accumulation. In wetland soils, low oxygen levels slow decomposition. Organic matter — including dead plant material — accumulates rather than breaking down, forming deep, carbon-rich peat layers. This makes wetlands among the most efficient carbon sinks on Earth per unit area.
One important nuance: plant uptake alone is not a permanent solution for phosphorus. Unless plant biomass is harvested and removed from the wetland, the phosphorus stored in plant tissue gets released back into the water column when those plants die. The truly sustainable pathway for phosphorus removal is the slow accretion of new soil from plant litter — a process that works over years and decades, not days.
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Cattails are among the most ecologically productive plants in North American freshwater wetlands. Their dense root systems trap and process nutrient-laden runoff, and their standing stems provide nesting cover for red-winged blackbirds, marsh wrens, and muskrats year-round. Decomposing cattail litter builds the soil carbon that supports denitrifying bacteria.
One caveat: Two non-native or hybrid cattail variants — narrow-leaf cattail (T. angustifolia, introduced from Europe) and the hybrid T. × glauca — are invasive in many regions and can form monocultures that displace native vegetation. When planting, specify native broad-leaf cattail and monitor spread.
Wildlife: Red-winged blackbirds, muskrats, mallards, great blue herons Region: Throughout North America
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A workhorse of both natural and constructed wetlands, hardstem bulrush is highly effective at phosphorus removal and provides dense cover and seed for waterfowl. Its round pithy stems are a nesting material used by dozens of bird species, and its seeds are consumed by canvasbacks, pintail, and teal from late summer through winter.
Bulrush is commonly used in restoration projects specifically because of its documented phosphorus uptake performance in scientific trials alongside other wetland species.
Wildlife: Canada geese, teal, pintail, muskrats, coots Region: Western and central North America; widely used in restoration across the East
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With over 500 species across North America, sedges are the foundational plants of wetland meadows, streambanks, and seepy areas in virtually every region. Their dense root mats prevent erosion, their dead stems provide overwintering habitat for dozens of ground-nesting insects, and their seeds feed a wide range of marsh birds and small mammals.
Sedge meadows are critical breeding habitat for sedge wrens, bobolinks, and spotted salamanders. They're also important for insectivorous birds during nesting season: the invertebrate density in healthy sedge communities is substantially higher than in mowed grass or degraded wetlands.
Wildlife: Sedge wrens, bobolinks, salamanders, dragonflies Region: Continental — species specific to nearly every ecoregion
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Unlike most milkweeds, swamp milkweed thrives in standing water and saturated soils, making it one of the few keystone plants that bridges the pollinator and wetland worlds. It is a primary larval host plant for monarch butterflies in wetland habitats, and its deep-pink flower clusters are a high-value late-summer nectar source for bees, hummingbirds, and migrating monarchs.
Goldfinches harvest the seeds from the dried pods, which persist well into winter.
Wildlife: Monarchs (larval host), native bees, hummingbirds, goldfinches Region: Eastern and central North America
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A native iris with violet-blue blooms, blue flag iris stabilizes wet shorelines with an extensive rhizome network while providing pollen and nectar for specialist native bees — including Dieunomia bees that depend on Iris as a preferred pollen source.
It performs exceptionally well in rain garden and bioswale plantings because it tolerates both seasonal flooding and brief dry periods. Its visual appeal also makes it a gateway plant: gardeners who install it for aesthetics end up supporting specialist pollinators they didn't know existed.
Wildlife: Native specialist bees, butterflies, muskrats Region: Eastern North America
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One of the few native shrubs that thrives in standing water for extended periods, buttonbush fills a critical gap in late-summer nectar availability. Its distinctive spherical white flowers bloom from July through September — after most spring wildflowers have finished and before fall goldenrods peak — making it an irreplaceable mid-season resource.
Waterfowl consume its seeds heavily in fall and winter. Wood ducks, prothonotary warblers, and yellow-billed cuckoos nest in or near buttonbush thickets.
Wildlife: Wood ducks, teal, prothonotary warblers, bees, skippers Region: Eastern and central North America
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Wild rice is a foundational species for waterfowl habitat across the Great Lakes and upper Midwest. Canvasbacks, ring-necked ducks, and wood ducks depend on its seeds as a primary fall migration food source, and its tall stands provide cover for breeding marsh birds including soras, coots, and common moorhens.
Native wild rice is distinct from the cultivated wild rice sold in grocery stores. Restoring it to degraded wetlands supports both wildlife populations and Indigenous food traditions that depend on the species.
Wildlife: Canvasback, ring-neck duck, wood duck, sandhill cranes, mink Region: Great Lakes, upper Midwest, northeastern North America
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North America's only native lotus creates floating canopies that shade out invasive aquatic vegetation while providing basking platforms for turtles and foraging habitat for waterfowl. Its large seed pods persist through winter as an important food source for wood ducks and other waterfowl when little else is available.
American lotus is native — it should not be confused with the more widely available Asian sacred lotus (N. nucifera), which is non-native and lacks the same wildlife value.
Wildlife: Wood ducks, painted turtles, bullfrogs, bees Region: Eastern and central North America; some populations in the Southwest
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The 2024 USFWS report paints a clear picture of ongoing loss. Vegetated wetland loss rates increased 50% between 2009 and 2019 compared to the prior decade. The declines were most severe in the Southeast, the Carolinas coastal watersheds, the Delmarva Peninsula, Florida, Louisiana, and Texas.
The consequences ripple across species. 50% of North American bird species depend on wetlands at some point in their life cycle. 61% of U.S. amphibian species are currently in decline — many directly tied to wetland loss. Two-thirds of freshwater mollusk species are at risk of extinction.
Planting keystone wetland species — even in small-scale rain gardens, bioswales, and backyard wet areas — contributes meaningfully to reversing this trend. Each patch of native wetland vegetation added to the landscape extends the connected habitat network these species need.
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Match plants to your hydrology first. Cattail and bulrush tolerate permanent standing water; swamp milkweed and sedges prefer seasonally wet soils that dry in summer; blue flag iris and buttonbush tolerate intermediate conditions. Getting this wrong is the most common reason wetland plantings fail.
Source local ecotypes. Plants grown from locally sourced seed are better adapted to local climate patterns and better support local specialist insects that have co-evolved with regional populations.
Control invasives before planting. Introducing natives into areas dominated by purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria) or invasive Phragmites (Phragmites australis, European strain) requires managing those species first or the investment will be lost.
Plant in community. A diverse assemblage of wetland species is more resilient and ecologically valuable than a monoculture of any single species.
Use our Native Plant Finder to filter keystone plants by ecosystem type and find nursery sources in your state.