Wetlands are everywhere.

Just ask the two dozen or so young science enthusiasts, budding conservationists, aspiring environmentalists and many of their parents who attended a program on wetlands at the Emmaus Public Library July 19.

Part of the ‘Buckets Full of Nature’ series, the program featured Lehigh County Conservation District Environmental Education and Outreach Coordinator Laura Hopek who brought many interesting wetlands artifacts, including a beaver skull, a muskrat pelt, the shed skin of snake and a baby snapping turtle in a jar for participants to see up close.

Attendees also made bookmarks decorated with thumbprint frogs and a lily pad fashioned from small paper plates and decorated with a dragonfly with tissue paper wings.

Wetlands, Hopek told her audience, can be found in all 50 states and all over the world. For instance, the land on which the Emmaus Pubilc Library stands once was a wetland.

Wetlands, Hopek explained, are an ecosystem. Functions of wetlands include providing homes and shelter to creatures such as snakes, fish, frogs, bugs, dragonflies, beetles and beavers and cleaning and purifying water by filtering it through the often abundant vegetation such as grasses, cattails and moss.

“When water leaves the wetlands it is clear,” Hopek said, adding wetlands also help prevent flooding.

Bogs, marshes and swamps are all wetlands, Hopek explained.

Despite their benefits, however, it is best to stay alert and practice caution in and near wetlands.

For example, Hopek said, don’t try to walk or swim across a wetland.

Hopek read aloud Jennifer Dirubbio’s book “Near One Cattail: Turtles, Logs and Leaping Frogs” to close the program and reinforce much of what she and the attendees talked about during the program.

Emmaus Public Library Youth Services Librarian “Miss Sue” Monroe was pleased with the large attendance of children and their adults.

“This is excellent, excellent,” Monroe said.