Heavy metal concentrations, distributions and mobilities in wetland soil profiles were investigated. Therefore in the UFZ department of Soil Sciences, a multiparameter approach to wetland identification and delineration is used in an interdisciplinary project RIVA (Development of a Generalised Robust Indication System for Ecological Changes in Riverside Wetlands). Field studies and process investigations in laboratory systems will serve to elucidate and transformation of carbon, nutrients and pollutants in wetlands and index them with respect to the ecological load condition of wetland soils. We investigated in detail different wetland soils of the river Elbe. Soil samples from an Eutric Regosol and from an Eutric Fluvisol were collected according to different soil horizons down to 2 m depth. The amount of heavy metal concentrations depends on kind of soil. In clay and loamy horizons the concentrations are mostly higher than in sandy soil horizons. Heavy metal concentrations indicated appropriate different fluvial layers. Partly we found extremely high concentrations of heavy metals in soils. So we measured concentrations of zinc up to 900 ppm, respectively, of copper up to 176 ppm, of nickel up to 6 ppm, of lead up to 270 ppm and of cadmium up to 7 ppm. Often the heavy metal concentrations exceed all critical values. Furthermore we studied mobile parts of heavy metals in water and NH4N03-extracts. Although the mobility of watersoluble extract was mostly very low (< 1 %), we observed that in the Eutric Regosol the NH4N03 - soluble parts of copper, nickel and cadmium were sometimes very high. Nevertheless, we found high NH4NOs-soluble parts of copper and zinc in the Eutric Fluvisol, too.