can't ride a bike here

[bmccasland]

This is where I was yesterday, in a boat in the marshes and swamps north of Lake Boudreaux, which is about a mile SE of Houma, in south central Louisiana. This is what salt water intrusion does to a cypress swamp. According to the lead biologist on this trip, everything that's open water used to have marsh grass. The second photo isn't quite a bucolic as it seems, the depth of field is flattened, so the marsh grass is growing on the edge of the oil field canal that I'm standing on, dead cypress trees in the back. The project wants to divert fresh water, which will push out the salt water, and hopefully allow some of the plants to come back. The shrubs, out in the open water areas, are "floats," pieces of salt marsh lifted up by the storm surge from Hurricanes Lili (2002) and Rita (2005) and deposited inland.


And yes, it was raining, hard, at times.
Oh, and swamps have trees, marshes don't. But what do you call it when there used to be trees?

[Hub]

Maybe a pedal/paddle boat ?

[bmccasland]

I should mention that the water level was "high" because of the south winds blowing in from the gulf. Normally the water is about 1.5 ft deep, so yesterday, the water was 2-3 ft deep. Basically shallow open water, need a very shallow draft boat under normal circumstances. Also, most of it is technically private land, No Trespassing (note the little sign). The bayous are state water bottom, so one could paddle along them, oil field canals can become defacto "public" unless otherwise posted.

[uk elephant]

You sound like you have a really cool job! You get to spend the day tootling about in a facinating landscape rather than cooped up in an office all day. But then I am an ecologist myself so I may be biased....

[Deborajen]

Oh, and swamps have trees, marshes don't. But what do you call it when there used to be trees?

A "swarsh" maybe?

Sounds like quite an undertaking trying to re-grow where there had been salt water. I didn't know it was even possible - at least not for a long time - but then again I'm not a scientist.

You do have a cool job - I'm sitting here at my computer in the middle of a four-story building and can't even see outside.

Deb

[Zen]

Is this a quiz?
Will there be a prize?
How about "undefined wetland"?

[sundial]

Better yet, have you seen the ivory billed woodpecker in those swampy/marshy wetlands?

[smilingcat]

OMG!!!

So sad... all those dead cypress trees. Even in the second photo, you can see all the dead trees. And it's not just the dead trees, all the animals and fish that depend on the living thriving grove have left.

Is the salt water encroachement caused by pumping out too much water out of the ground? or is it pumping out natural gas and crude?

Sometimes, I could cry when I see such devastation. The forest in the Rockies used to be beautiful, now you can see dead trees everywhere... barren and grey. victims to pollution and to the beetles.

Well, you can't ride your bike out on the bayou...

Smilingcat

[bmccasland]

Sundial - nope, haven't seen an Ivorybill. Most of the time I'm in a motorized boat, so birds fly off. There hasn't been much talk among the Cajuns about the bird either, although the Atchafalaya Swamp (a CHAF a LIE a - all short "a's") is one spot they're thought to be.

Smilingcat - Why did the trees die, or rather why the saltwater intrusion so far inland... The reason are, in no particular order:
The Mississippi River no longer runs free and unleveed - thus less sediment is caught in the coastal litoral flow, and then washed inland by tides and storm surges.
Oil was discovered, and many many canals were dug to get equipment to it. The worst are perpendicular to the Gulf, thus allowing straight lines for the salt water to get far inland.
Natural bayous were straightened for shipping
Earthquakes - yes we have them, but more like a crack in pudding. The goo that passes for soil sinks to a new lower level.
The natural sheet flow hydrology is totally screwed up by various sizes of canals and spoil bank ridges, thus when a storm surge does occur, it can't drain quickly out.
And once fresh plants are killed by saltwater being on them for too long, they die, and the fragile peaty soils start breaking down. Salt tolerant plants don't grow as fast as fresh plants.

And the important question - why should folks care? Do you like shrimpies??? The larval shrimp and many other fisheries species are dependant on inland marshes as nursery habitat. Oil & gas - 1/4 (i think) of what this nation uses comes out of or through Louisiana. There's more, but I'll stop.

[Tuckervill]

If you have an IMAX theater nearby, see if it is showing the movie "Hurricane on the Bayou". It's about the effects of Katrina and the way canals and levees have affected the Louisiana coast.

Karen

[Mr. Bloom]

This is what salt water intrusion does to a cypress swamp. According to the lead biologist on this trip, everything that's open water used to have marsh grass.

This is exactly what happened in Gulf Shores...and this was without a direct hit from a hurricane...in one season, it went from lush green to dead