# marsh / swamp / bog / fen / mire / quag etc. etc.



## lordess

hi everybody.
I wanted to know whether swamp has nearly or/ exactly the same meaning  as march or not?
to my information, swamp means either drawn or walk in a  forest while removingthe trees.


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## ace02nc

I believe you're referring to a "marsh". "March" is a different word altogether.

A swamp typically has a larger expanse of water and trees, whereas a marsh has more low-lying grass and reeds.


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## Harry Batt

It would be swamp or marsh. These two words have distinctive meanings, but I fear that they have earned the same meaning through usage. Probably only a surveyor would note the distinction. A thessaurus will list marshy land masses as morass, wetland, fens,moors,bogs, quagmire, wallows ad infinitum. Where this type of terrain exists, the denizens of the area probably agree on its name such as Everglades, name for a swampland in Florida. In an informal writing you are probably safe by picking anyone of these descriptions. In the Aleutian Islands the description is tundra but inland the best word is permafrost.


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## Harry Batt

Oh yes, welcome to the forum lordess


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## Thomas Tompion

lordess said:


> hi everybody.
> I wanted to know whether swamp has nearly or/ exactly the same meaning as march or not?
> to my information, swamp means either drawn or walk in a forest while removingthe trees.


Hi Lordess, and welcome to the forum.
I distinguish between a swamp and a marsh.  For me a swamp is altogether wetter and muddier and more dangerous.  A marsh is wet and may have little lakes in it, but you could think about walking across it, maybe stepping from tussock to tussock.  I'd think twice before trying to cross a swamp.


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## lordess

thanks all of you   for your answers. Indeed, I made  a mistake while typing, I meant marsh not march (month).


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## liliput

I found marsh defined as an area which is flooded during high tide or the wet season and typically remains waterlogged; and swamp is defined as a bog or marsh.

I agree with some of the distinctions made by other forum members - I think context is important. The UK has many marshes, but I can't think of any part that I would describe as a swamp - I generally think of swamps as being tropical or sub-tropical.

To give another example: The semi-nomadic arabs living in the wetlands of southern Iraq are referred to as "Marsh Arabs".


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## Bluelady

Hello, everybody,

What is in English the difference between _marsh _and _swamp_ ? Is it related to the size of this kind of "lake" ?
Thank you in advance,

Bluelady

<< Merged with an earlier thread.  >>


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## entangledbank

Difficult; I've never had any clear distinction between them (and we can add 'bog' to the list), but I suppose a marsh is generally rather flat, like the marshes of England, whereas a swamp may contain tall trees with mosses or lianas hanging from them, like the swamps of the eastern USA. I wouldn't call those marshes, though I could call the fens/marshes of England swamps.


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## Bluelady

Ok Entangledbank, thank you anyway, that's a start


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## Dmitry_86

Dear friends!!!

The definitions below have been borrowed by me from the Wordreference dictionary. I think that due to http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1782686  and http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1227096 I have got the difference between "march" and "swamp", but other related words still pose difficulties:

1. *Fen* is low-lying wet land with grassy vegetation; usually is a transition  zone between land and water; "thousands of acres of marshland"; "the  fens of eastern England"_

2. _*Bog* is a wet spongy  ground of decomposing vegetation; has poorer drainage than a swamp; soil  is unfit for cultivation but can be cut and dried and used for fuel3. *Mire* is a soft wet area of low-lying land that sinks underfoot

4. *Moor* is the _open land  usually with peaty soil covered with heather and bracken and moss _

5. _*Quag* is a soft wet area of low-lying land that  sinks underfoot _

6. *Quagmire* is _a soft wet  area of low-lying land that sinks underfoot  _

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From these definitions I can make the following conclusions:

1) *Quag*, *quagmire, and mire* are the same things. Is really so or there is some subtle difference between them?

2) What is the difference between "*fen*" and "*bog*"? As far as I have understood, "bog" can be used for obtaining fuel after special processing as the definition above says. Also bog contains decomposing and rotten (or decaying) vegetation, whereas "fen" has living grass and plants. 

3) What is "*moor*" exactly? Is it land containing fuel?

Thanks


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## panjandrum

Here are personal comments.

(1) Quag, quagmire and mire are more often used figuratively than for real.  In figurative use, there is no difference between them.  I very rarely use any of them.

(2) A fen is close to sea level, hence the description includes "transition between land and water".  A bog is usually at much highter level.  A bog contains a great deal of living vegetation.

(3) A moor is usually high ground with only low-growing vegetation - no trees or shrubs.  It does not necessarily contain fuel.

(Note that the thing that's a bit like a swamp is a marsh, not a march.)


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## iskndarbey

Aside from the technical definitions, _fen_ and _moor_ have pleasant, if somewhat barren, connotations, while _bog_ sounds smelly and dirty. Much more mud, standing water and decomposing vegetable matter in the latter.

As Panjandrum said, _quagmire _and _mire_ are used figuratively to mean a difficult situation. I've never heard _quag_.


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## Gautier51

Swamp, bog, marsh, morass, mire : what differences ?

I guess it is a hard one !

_"__Part of the pitch was a swamp__, and the players had to do battle on this swamp."
__"Or a panicking cow sinking into a bog."
"__The institutional Church of England is a morass of bureaucracy and petty-fogging pen-pushing."
"In the time since the king-of-the-universe career of her husband, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, crumbled into a mire of sex-crimes allegations, Sinclair—who used *..."
*"In order to keep his job, Kipps is sent to sell the Eel Marsh estate, your standard creepy haunted house located on a small island in the middle off a marsh."

_Do only specialists know the differences between those terms ?

Thank you in advance !


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## cyberpedant

Yes. To the common man these terms are almost synonymous.


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## Gautier51

Thank's. 
As far as connotations are concerned, is there anything to say ? 
Which ones can be used figuratively ?


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## PaulQ

“I am *bog*ged down [cannot move quickly] with work, *mire*d [stuck] in trivia, and *swamp*ed [overwhelmed] by a *morass* [formless mass] of paperwork.”


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## cyberpedant

All of them can—some to the point of cliché—be used figuratively.


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## JulianStuart

I would be a little surprised to see fen or moor used figuratively


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## Gautier51

I was only talking about about five of them : "Swamp, bog, marsh, morass, mire".

And another question : morass is the most figurative and less scientific of all : am I wright ?

And, last thing, "fen" refers to something with less water, between moor and marsh ?


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## cyberpedant

JulianStuart said:


> I would be a little surprised to see fen or moor used figuratively



My hazards still have been your solace: and 
Believe't not lightly—though I go alone, 
Like to a lonely dragon, that his* fen *
Makes fear'd and talk'd of more than seen
—Shakespeare, Coriolanus

As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd 
With raven's feather from unwholesome *fen *
Drop on you both! a south-west blow on ye 
And blister you all o'er! 
—The Tempest

Or as 'twere perfumed by a fen.
—The Tempest

(It could be argued that the word itself is not being used "figuratively" but is merely part of a metaphor.)


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## PaulQ

And another question : morass is the most figurative and less least scientific of all : am I wright right? I don't think you can have something that is most figurative or least figurative - it is either figurative or not. If you mean *most poorly defined*, then, yes, it probably is.

And, last thing, "fen" refers to something with less water, between moor and marsh? Your best way to understand 'fen' is to do a search on Google Images. 

It refers to a particular type of land/landscape that is perhaps only one metre above sea level - freshwater drains into it but occasionally the sea also washes in. It is characterised by lakes, ponds, marshes but with areas of land that are a little higher and allow trees to grow or even houses to be built.

Fens have also been subject to much artificial irrigation by use of dykes and pumps so as to reclaim land.


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## JulianStuart

cyberpedant said:


> My hazards still have been your solace: and
> Believe't not lightly—though I go alone,
> Like to a lonely dragon, that his* fen *
> Makes fear'd and talk'd of more than seen
> —Shakespeare, Coriolanus
> 
> As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd
> With raven's feather from unwholesome *fen *
> Drop on you both! a south-west blow on ye
> And blister you all o'er!
> —The Tempest
> 
> Or as 'twere perfumed by a fen.
> —The Tempest
> 
> (It could be argued that the word itself is not being used "figuratively" but is merely part of a metaphor.)


While my surprise is indeed small, I so argue


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## Forero

Does _moor_ really belong in the company of all those swampy words? To me a moor may be damp, but it is not full of standing water. You can sleep there without drowning, though you may be visited by spirits or witches.

A moored ship is quite a different thing to swamped ship or a bogged-down ship.


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## JulianStuart

Forero said:


> Does _moor_ really belong in the company of all those swampy words? To me a moor may be damp, but it is not full of standing water. You can sleep there without drowning, though you may be visited by spirits or witches.


I agree.  If the original question had been "Which is the odd one out?" it would have been easy 
From the wiki


> an extensive waste covered with patches of heath, and having a poor, light soil, but sometimes marshy, and abounding in peat; aheath


I think of the first part of that (open, windswept, not fertile, lots of heather, peat etc) but it may or may not have marshy bits or bogs within its boundaries.


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## lobelia.ophrys

Hello everybody, 

I'm wondering if there's a difference between these two words?

The word I'm looking for is for a bog or a swamp in a forest...


Thank you in advance!


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## suzi br

Hiya - have you used the dictionary in here? One of these words is used to define the other, so you can see the subtle difference and decide what level of wetness you want to have in your forest. 

Swamp tends to be wetter, basically, but most people would not stress over the difference!


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## lobelia.ophrys

Oh ok! Thanks a lot!!!


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## entangledbank

A bog might be smaller too. A swamp or marsh is a large area, perhaps the size of a field or more - the whole area is of that character. But a little place in a forest, which you can just walk around to avoid, I think I would call a bog.


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## lobelia.ophrys

Thank you very much for the precision and for your help!


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## bicontinental

Hi acid...burn,
I’m no expert on wetland habitats but my understanding of swamps versus bogs is that the difference is mainly in the vegetation (the species of plants and trees) based on differences in water flow, oxygenation, minerals etc. When I hear “bog” I think “peat moss” and “well preserved bog people” . A bog is a type of wetland characterized by low oxygen contents, acidic water and cold temperatures.


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## lobelia.ophrys

Thank you very much, dear bicontinental! 

It's well noted in my head now :-D


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## mr cat

Just a footnote. Although swamps technically exist in the UK I don't think it is a term used anywhere. We have fens, marshes, bogs etc but no 'swamps' that I know of.


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## pwmeek

AE definitions

Swamp = standing water; has trees

Marsh = standing water; has no trees

Bog = wetland with acid soil; typical vegetation is Sphagnum Moss (ends up as peat)


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## lobelia.ophrys

Thank you very much to all of you and thanks a lot, pwmeek! Now it's precise and all clear in my head! 

Thanks a lot!


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## suzi br

Ah, yes.  I didn't think of the American angle! We don't hav that sort of terrain in the UK.


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## Keith Bradford

Strangely, nobody has given the answer that I always thought was the fundamental: *Marsh is temperate, swamp is tropical.*  But perhaps it explains Mr Cat's reply at #33.


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## pwmeek

We call _an area of standing water with trees_ a *swamp* in Michigan, which is a long way from tropical. I have 20 acres (8 hectares) of swamp on my property, as well as some marsh nearby.

Check the Wikipedia entries on the four types of Wetland: Swamp, Marsh, Bog and Fen

Swamp and Marsh are defined by the type of vegetation (Swamp = woody plants; Marsh = herbaceous plants)

Bog and Fen are defined by the type of water that feeds them (Bog = acidic, low nutrient; Fen = neutral to alkaline, some minerality). Bogs also accumulate Peat (because of the acidity which slows decay).

Edit: in the UK, the common term for Swamp is "Wooded Wetland" (which may account for why there seem to be no swamps in the UK).


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## vladkornea

Common types of *wetlands* include *swamps*, *marshes*, and *mires*. 

True *swamps* are dominated by trees, though transitional *shrub swamps* also exist. In contrast, *marshes* and *mires* are dominated by herbaceous (non-woody) plants such as grasses and reeds.

* Marshes* are permeated by slowly flowing water or are regularly flooded, and are particularly common along river deltas and estuaries. In contrast, *mires* contain primarily standing water, and are known as *peatlands* because they produce a lot of peat (decaying plant matter).

* Mires* are divided into *bogs* and *fens*. *Bogs* form in ground indentations in which rain collects but negligible contact is made with other bodies of water; they're generally found at higher altitudes than marshes. While saltwater marshes exist, bogs are always acidic and poor in nutrients, and thus tend to have more mosses and carnivorous plants. *Fens* are mires that have more contact with ground water than bogs, and can therefore often be alkaline or rich in nutrients.


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## rituparnahoymoy

pwmeek said:


> We call _an area of standing water with trees_ a *swamp* in Michigan, which is a long way from tropical. I have 20 acres (8 hectares) of swamp on my property, as well as some marsh nearby.
> 
> Check the Wikipedia entries on the four types of Wetland: Swamp, Marsh, Bog and Fen
> 
> Swamp and Marsh are defined by the type of vegetation (Swamp = woody plants; Marsh = herbaceous plants)
> 
> Bog and Fen are defined by the type of water that feeds them (Bog = acidic, low nutrient; Fen = neutral to alkaline, some minerality). Bogs also accumulate Peat (because of the acidity which slows decay).
> 
> Edit: in the UK, the common term for Swamp is "Wooded Wetland" (which may account for why there seem to be no swamps in the UK).




I want to know the difference between Marshes and Swamps. 

Swamp : an area of low-lying, uncultivated ground where water collects; a bog or marsh.

Marsh : an area of low-lying land which is flooded in wet seasons or at high tide, and typically remains waterlogged at all times.

Photos will help me make a distinction between the two.


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## Keith Bradford

Honestly, I think there's little difference between the two, except that marshes are generally in cooler countries and swamps in the tropics.


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## rituparnahoymoy

Keith Bradford said:


> Honestly, I think there's little difference between the two, except that marshes are generally in cooler countries and swamps in the tropics.



Thanks a lot. So If I call a particular area which looks like this as shown below as either a swamp or a marsh it should make no difference.


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## NevenaT

Is there a difference in meaning of the word 'moor' in AE and BrE? I always thought that a moor is wet land with vegetation, then I looked the word up and realised that that is what they call 'moor' in America only, in the UK a moor wouldn't be wet, just flat land with some low vegetation.


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## NevenaT

At least that is what the Oxford dictionary says, have I understood this well?


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## kentix

I've never personally heard moor used in the U.S. It's always in books about England. 

I wouldn't call the picture in post #42 a swamp. It's too open.

This is a swamp in Louisiana.





And here's one in Germany.





Swamp - Wikipedia


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## sdgraham

NevenaT said:


> At least that is what the Oxford dictionary says, have I understood this well?


I've never encountered anything in the U.S. we call a moor.
(We know the word through reading British novels.)
[cross-posted]


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## NevenaT

So I've been reading and wrongly imagining people wading through wet land and grass instead of strolling on dry flat ground. Interesting!

I mean unless a moor can also be wet. Which the dictionary doesn't say.


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## ewie

rituparnahoymoy said:


>


I'd definitely call that _wetlands_.



NevenaT said:


> Is there a difference in meaning of the word 'moor' in AE and BrE? I always thought that a moor is wet land with vegetation, then I looked the word up and realised that that is what they call 'moor' in America only, in the UK a moor wouldn't be wet, just flat land with some low vegetation.


This is what *English* moors typically look like (this is Exmoor in Devon): they're quite high up, hilly but rarely mountainous, sparse/poor vegetation, boggy patches, sometimes peaty, and _empty_.




This is Widdop Moor on the border between Lancashire and Yorkshire ~ pretty similar:


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## NevenaT

Yes, that's what I've found too. The dictionary does list though that in AE a moor is the same as a fen, but people here say they don't even use that word in the US.


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## sdgraham

NevenaT said:


> Yes, that's what I've found too. The dictionary does list though that in AE a moor is the same as a fen, but people here say they don't even use that word in the US.


That's why we, your native English-speaking friends, are here to help;


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## NevenaT

And thank you for that, I often wonder at how much time and patience everyone on this forum is willing to invest in helping others!


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## kentix

Who owns those moors (that moorland), Ewie?


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## ewie

'Various landowners', I imagine


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## kentix

Like I said, the only time I've seen the word moor is in references from novels taking place in England where people are out wandering the moors. I could never tell if it was communal land.

Speaking of England, I bet you don't have many bayous there, at least by that name. A bayou is another name used for a certain type of wetland in parts of the U.S.

_bay•ou /ˈbaɪu, ˈbaɪoʊ/  n. [countable], pl.*-ous.* _

_Dialect Terms(in the southern U.S.) a body of water, usually muddy and still or with a slow current._
_WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2018
bay•ou  (bī*′*o̅o̅, bī*′*ō), n., pl.  *-ous.* [Chiefly Lower Mississippi Valley and Gulf States._

_Dialect Terms - a marshy arm, inlet, or outlet of a lake, river, etc., usually sluggish or stagnant._
_Dialect Terms- any of various other often boggy and slow-moving or still bodies of water_
That's some pronunciation fun when you've never seen the word before.


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## Keith Bradford

The moors are often in private ownership - especially in Scotland where grouse moors are favoured shooting land for rich landowners and their guests.  But a movement begun a hundred years ago for public access ("the right to roam") led to many of the paths across moors in England becoming de facto a public right of way. For instance, the longest inland footpath, the Pennine Way, follows the backbone of England for 268 miles.

As can be seen on their website Pennine Way | National Trails, much of the Way crosses moors: *peaty upland* with many standing pools and streams but very little of it could be called wetland, swamp or fen.  It is *boggy *in parts, but in dry weather there is a risk of extensive fires because the peat forms a natural fuel.


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## heypresto

kentix said:


> Speaking of England, I bet you don't have many bayous there, at least by that name. A bayou is another name used for a certain type of wetland in parts of the U.S.



You're right. I suspect many (most?) of us have only come across the word in Roy Orbison's 1963 classic _Blue Bayou_, and perhaps the odd movie.


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## kentix

I first learned that word when our family moved to Texas when I was young. It's not used in most parts of the country.


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