PROTECTING OUR CORNER OF THE WATERSHED

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Protecting Our Corner of the Watershed

 

Michigan Watersheds: Everyone Lives in a Watershed

 

Living in a watershed is not a choice like deciding if you want to live in the country or the city.  If you live on earth you live in a watershed!  Your daily actions affect the health of the Michigan watershed where you live and work - whether it is an intentional act or an automatic routine behavior.

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A watershed is the land area from which surface runoff and groundwater drain into a body of water.  Any rain or snow that falls on your property or place of work, whether it soaks into the ground (infiltration) or runs off over the surface of the land (stormwater), it all moves downhill to the nearest lake, stream or river.  All of the land area that contributes to this body of water is known as a watershed.

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The water doesn't stop when it reaches the nearest lake, stream or river.  It keeps flowing into larger and larger bodies of water.  In Michigan watersheds, small streams flow into major rivers which all empty into the Great Lakes.  Water in the Great Lakes continues to run eastward through the St. Lawrence River and eventually into the Atlantic Ocean.  Groundwater follows this same path.

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Remember, clean waterways benefit EVERYONE!

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Greater Lansing Regional Committee

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