A Changing Bayou Highlights Threats to Waterfowl
Will Poston for SPLIT REED
In Duck Camp Dinners Episode Three, “Roots Run Deep,” Chef Jean-Paul highlights how much the Louisiana Bayou has changed throughout his lifetime. Chef is not speaking in hyperbole or exaggerating about the “good ‘ol days.” Louisiana is losing massive tracts of coastal wetland--i.e., its historic waterfowl habitats. Both natural and anthropogenic events are causing this phenomenon. “It’s undeniable that you see the changes occurring right in front of your eyes and the differences you remember as a child,” recounts Chef.
Wetland loss in Southern Louisiana is a complex issue, but the situation is dire. Unless action is taken, “these wetlands will completely disappear,” wrote Holly Shaftel of NASA. Chef identified many of the changes he has witnessed in the Bayou: “storms are getting bigger;” “canals are getting wider;” “the swamps, marshes, and grasslands are changing.” Climate change is creating stronger and more frequent storms. Naturally, these wetlands would have weathered these storms and defended coastal communities against storms and flooding. However, Louisiana is losing its wetland habitats that waterfowl need and its storm defenses, because of an ill-conceived levee system.
Louisiana’s levee system was constructed to prevent the Mississippi River’s flooding from destroying property. Unfortunately, it is also causing Louisiana’s coastal wetlands to--quite literally--sink into the ocean. Without the Mississippi River’s sediment, blocked by the levees, the wetlands cannot regenerate and are susceptible to heightened rates of erosion. For example, estimates find that Louisiana loses between 25-35 square miles of wetlands annually.
National Geographic’s Sara Gibbins provides an understandable summary in this article: “One paper published in 2017 estimated that the Louisiana coast sinks at a rate of eight millimeters per year. Seas also are rising quickly around the delta, about 3 millimeters a year, compared to the 0.6 millimeters seen 600 years ago, when the delta was still growing. The combined effect of the sinking and the rising water is a rapidly disappearing coastline.”
An upcoming government report on wetlands is due in 2022, but it is clear that we are rapidly losing a great acreage of wetlands. The last report by the US Fish and Wildlife Service documented an average loss of 80,000 acres of wetlands per year across the country. This has direct implications for waterfowl, which Chef noticed in the bayou. Their ducks are changing in response to the bayou’s changing ecosystem and food sources. In other parts of the country, wetland loss is impacting certain waterfowl breeding habitats, important migration corridors, and wintering grounds. Roots run deep at duck camp, but the roots holding wetlands and waterfowl habitat together do not run deep enough to withstand the forces they’re up against.
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