By Emily Davis, Member, Southeastern Pennsylvania Group; Geodelphia Member
Since the Texas flash flood, I have been thinking about leaves and rain, and our water in general. I have many memories of being sheltered from the rain by a large tree. I also remember the rainwater running down an incline in my neighbor’s lawn that we could use like a natural slip and slide in a summer rainstorm, and splashing around in the giant puddle that formed where the lawn leveled out.
I remember what happened in the story of the Apricot Lane Farm, portrayed in the documentary film, The Biggest Little Farm, after 18 inches of rain fell in a single storm. About 5 years had been spent rebuilding the soil on the farm, planting fruit trees with a cover crop of native grasses and herbaceous plants between them. When the rain fell, the plants slowed the water, and the soil was able to absorb it. What the plants didn’t use helped replenish the aquifer. The neighboring farms were not so lucky. With compacted soil and little ground cover, the flood waters carried off their topsoil.
In my Penn State Master Watershed Steward course, I learned that the rapid rise and fall of flood waters is much more extreme today than it was before our landscape included so much impermeable surface.
While Pennsylvania is richer in water than southern California, where Apricot Lane Farm is, we still need to improve our land so it has time to absorb rainwater. The leaves of trees, shrubs, and herbaceous plants catch the raindrops and slow them down so the soil can absorb them. That water percolates deeper into the soil to replenish our groundwater. While Pennsylvania has more miles of streams and rivers than any other state except Alaska, about 25% of Pennsylvanians get their water from wells that tap into the groundwater, so it is important that we prevent runoff and allow rainwater to trickle down to the aquifer.
Ninety-nine percent of that fresh water available to us is groundwater. Throughout the country, groundwater aquifers are shrinking. We are using up our water bank account faster than we can replenish it. The inability of our soils to absorb the deposits nature tries to create just makes it worse.
Flash floods are killing people right in front of us. The depletion of our aquifers will kill our future.
This blog was included as part of the August 2025 Sylvanian newsletter. Please click here to check out more articles from this edition!