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Floating Islands and Biology

Floating IslandAlfio Bonanno
Restorer Technology is borrowed from an analogous component in nature known as the floating island. These islands are formed as dense mats of vegetation - typically made up of cattails, bulrush, sedge and reeds - extend outward from shoreline wetlands. As the water gets deeper the roots no longer reach the bottom, so they use the oxygen in their root mass for buoyancy, and the surrounding vegetation for support to retain their top-side-up orientation. The area beneath these floating mats is exceptionally rich in aquatic biota.

Floating IslandAlfio Bonanno
On the walkway of a RestorerEventually, storm events tear whole sections (sometimes several hectares) free from the shore. The islands migrate around a lake with changing winds, occasionally reattaching to a new area of the shoreline, or breaking up in heavy weather. As one naturalist described, "floating islands act like kidneys in a system, providing the oxygen rich surface area that keeps the ecosystem in balance during extreme seasonal fluctuations.