Watershed management is the study of the relevant characteristics of a watershed aimed at the sustainable distribution of its resources and the process of creating and implementing plans, programs, and projects to sustain and enhance watershed functions that affect the plant, animal, and human communities within a watershed boundary.[1] Features of a watershed that agencies seek to manage include water supply, water quality, drainage, stormwater runoff, water rights, and the overall planning and utilization of watersheds. Landowners, land use agencies, stormwater management experts, environmental specialists, water use surveyors and communities all play an integral part in the management of a watershed.

Contents

• 1 Sources of pollution • 2 Controlling pollution • 3 Governance • 4 Environmental law • 5 See also • 6 References • 7 Further reading • 8 External links o 8.1 Coastal Zones

Sources of pollution

In an agricultural landscape, common contributors to water pollution are nutrients and sediment which typically enter stream systems after rainfall washes them off poorly managed agricultural fields, called surface runoff, or flushes them out of the soil through leaching. These types of pollutants are considered nonpoint source pollution because the exact point where the pollutant originated cannot be identified. Such pollutants remain a major issue for water ways because the difficulty to control their sources hinders any attempt to limit the pollution.[2] Point source pollution originates a specific point of contamination such as if a manure containment structure fails and its contents enter the drainage system or when a factory discharges its waste directly into a body of water using a pipe.
In urban landscapes, issues of soil loss through erosion, from construction sites for example, and nutrient