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An Overview / 11 5, 6, and 7 present criteria for evaluating water availability, channel stability, and soil salinity, respectively. Finally, Chapter 8 provides some important considerations for organizing the acquired information into a viable riparian recovery plan. The epilogue clarifies the premises and the goals of this book. Defining Some Important Terms Although a glossary is provided at the end of the book, definitions of several terms are highlighted here to clarify their meaning from the outset. Ecosystem Manager For this guidebook, the term ecosystem manager has a very broad, inclusion- ary meaning, referring to anyone who is involved with evaluating an eco- system with the intent of developing a plan for improving its condition. Bottomland Ecosystem versus Riparian Ecosystem Most biologists and ecologists use the term riparian ecosystem to describe "vegetation, habitat, or an ecosystem that is associated with bodies of water (streams or lakes) or is dependent on the existence of perennial, intermittent, or ephemeral surface or subsurface water drainage" (Arizona Riparian Coun- ciI1996). In this respect, the term riparian has a fairly broad meaning, and the extent of a riparian area is determined by several parameters, including water availability, topography, and vegetation characteristics. However, for many hydrologists the term riparian has a more narrow meaning, referring only to the area immediately adjacent to a natural watercourse. The term bottomland avoids this disparity because it is used only to de- scribe a specific type oflandscape: bottomlarid is defined as low-lying, nearly flat land along a watercourse. Bottomlands are formed of terraces, floodplains, and all surfaces lower than the floodplain, including the channel. Bottomland ecosystems are the biotic communities associated with the bottomlands of rivers, streams, lakes, and other landscape settings where the availability of water is greater than in the surrounding uplands. In many situations, use of the term bottomland ecosystem is preferable because it avoids the confusion that the term riparian ecosystem can cause. Nevertheless, riparian ecosystem is used more widely, and because this book draws heavily from the biological perspective, riparian ecosystem will be used here.