Bottomland
Bottomland is the low, level ground along a stream. The federal naming system lists bottom as a name for the land within a stream bend, and first bottom as a name for a level bench on a hill's flank. The word describes where ground sits; it is not a wetland designation or a flood hazard finding.
A bend's bottom, a bench's first bottom, and EPA's river swamp
Bottomland is used in two senses that sound alike and describe different ground: the naming system's words for land in a stream bend or on a hillside bench, and EPA's bottomland hardwood forest.
Curve in the course of a stream and (or) the land within the curve; a curve in a linear body of water (bottom, loop, meander).
USGS Geographic Names Information System, feature class definitions
Area of level to gently sloping land on the flank of an elevation such as a hill, ridge, or mountain where the slope of the land rises on one side and descends on the opposite side (first bottom, flood-plain step, level, terrace, tread).
USGS Geographic Names Information System, feature class definitions
Those two entries sit in different feature classes. A bottom is filed with the curve of a stream, as the land inside a bend. A first bottom is filed with a bench, level to gently sloping land on the flank of a hill, ridge or mountain, next to the name flood-plain step. Neither entry says how often the ground is wet, how it drains or what grows on it.
The other sense comes from EPA's wetlands pages.
Bottomland hardwood forests are river swamps. They are found along rivers and streams of the southeast and south central United States, generally in broad floodplains.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Wetlands
That describes a forest type found generally in broad floodplains across a large region. It does not say that a bottom named in a deed or lying on a farm is a swamp, and it does not say that one is not. Whether a particular low area is a wetland, and what that finding limits, is decided the way the guide to wetlands and what they limit explains, not by the word bottomland.
The flood map, not the name, places a bottom in or out of a flood zone
Calling ground bottomland describes where it sits. It does not say whether that ground lies inside a mapped flood hazard area.
That finding comes from the FEMA flood map, and the county floodplain administrator is the office that reads it for a parcel. What a floodplain is has its own entry, and reading the map for a specific tract is walked through in reading a floodplain map.
The answer matters even for a farm building. Farm buildings and structures are exempt from the Uniform Statewide Building Code, with exceptions, and one of those exceptions reaches low ground: farm buildings and structures lying within a flood plain or a mudslide-prone area stay subject to flood-proofing or mudslide regulations, as applicable. That is one reason the map matters more than the name on a bottom where a barn or a shed might go.
Trees and water on a bottom bring their own questions
A creek bottom on a farm raises the same timber and water questions as any other part of the tract, and the word bottomland answers none of them.
A hardwood stand on a bottom is still a hardwood stand. EPA's term names a regional forest type, not the trees on a given farm, and whether a bottom's timber is worth a timber cruise before a sale is the same question an upland stand raises.
What a creek adds to a farm, apart from the ground beside it, is its own subject in does a spring or creek add value to a farm.
Have a farm with a creek bottom on it?
Send the county and where the creek runs through the farm, and Lowell will talk through the bottom ground and point you to the flood map and the office that reads it. No cost, no obligation.
Got it. Thank you.
We'll be in touch shortly with an honest read.
Questions about this term
Is a first bottom the same thing as a bottom in the naming system?
No. GNIS lists them under different features. A bottom is a name for the land within the curve of a stream bend. A first bottom is one of the names for a bench, an area of level to gently sloping land on the flank of a hill, ridge or mountain, where the slope rises on one side and descends on the other. Both are naming entries, not measurements of how wet or how flat a field is.
Where this page's facts come from
Every rule, office and figure above traces to one of these. Rules change; check the office before you act on one.
- GNIS Domestic Names Feature Class Definitions U.S. Geological Survey
- Wetlands: Bottomland Hardwoods U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
- Va. Code 36-99: farm building exemption from the Building Code, and the flood plain and mudslide exception Code of Virginia