****o again,

Ignoring any Supreme Court Rulings on the legality of the 1987 Manual and Section 404 of the CWA, etc, etc, etc.... I have a simple question.

I am doing wetland determinations in the Atlanta, GA area and came across a site with lots of granite rock outcrops. I came across two small areas (maybe just 50 x 50-feet square) where the rock formed a depression that collected water and hydrophytic vegetation was growing. However, there was little to no soil present.

Based on the ACOE Manual would this be considered a wetland? Sadly, the firm I work for currently has no senior biologist (I am it) to bounce this off of so your help is muchly appreciated.

---Sean

Dissolution pools on granite (or other rock outcrops) that posses vascular plant vegetation do contain soil, although the soil layer may be extremely thin and/or confined to cracks in the underlying rock. rooted vascular plants typically require soil to grow. In a dissolution pool, where the water is typically present for much of the year, one generally classifies the soils as hydric based on either the period of inundation or based on assuming hydric soils because "The entire project area is occupied by a plant community or communities in which all dominant species are OBL" (from 87 manual).

Ignoring the 3 parameter method outlined in the 87 manual, most ecologists/botanists/scientists who work with rock outcrops would consider dissolution pools as wetlands because of the plant communities they support - predominately or exclusively obligate hydrophytes. This would allow one to clasify the area as a wetland based on BPJ.

Whether this wetland is hydrologically connected and thus subject to jurisdiction under the 404 program is yet another matter. Typically there is an intermittent connection through a seasonal channel to jurisdictional waters, but that will not always be the case.