It’s a scene straight out of Louisiana lore, a seeming exemplar of swamp life: Craggy cypress bushes, moss dangling from their branches, stretch out for 1000’s of acres atop darkish, shallow waters.
However a fast look doesn’t do it justice. The truth is, the Maurepas Swamp, masking an enormous space between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, is dying.
Maurepas Swamp revitalization plans: The state is planning to reconnect the Maurepas Swamp west of New Orleans to the Mississippi River via a diversion channel, with the twin goal of enhancing storm defenses and revitalizing the ecosystem.
“It’s been dying for nearly a century now,” Brad Miller, venture supervisor with the state Coastal Safety and Restoration Authority, stated earlier than boarding a ship to traverse the Blind River into the swamp final week. “And the factor with swamps is, it occurs actually, actually gradual.”
Revitalizing a large swath of the second-largest swamp in Louisiana has been mentioned for no less than a pair a long time, however sufficient stars have lastly aligned to permit the venture to maneuver ahead. Work is anticipated to start within the months forward on a novel venture that can inject freshwater from the Mississippi River, handing the swamp a brand new lease on life.
The plan is anticipated to learn round 45,000 acres – the scale of round 35 New Orleans Metropolis Parks – and the goal is twofold: to enhance the area’s storm protections whereas reviving an ecosystem that was as soon as a chief spot for wildlife, as duck hunters will attest.
Wetlands just like the Maurepas Swamp are able to flattening storm surge, and dealing to revive them has been a tough lesson realized for hurricane-hit coastal Louisiana.
A wildlife administration signal within the Maurepas Swamp on Friday, February 3, 2023. (Photograph by Chris Granger | The Occasions-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate)
“If you happen to’re fascinated about hurricane safety, that’s the best way to go – to construct swamp,” stated Gary Shaffer, a professor at Southeastern Louisiana College in Hammond who has studied the world and advocated for the venture for greater than 20 years.
Reconnecting the river
For Miller and Shaffer, the venture might have at occasions appeared elusive. However an unlikely set of circumstances means the state now hopes to start out development in the summertime, at an estimated whole price of round $300 million.
One issue that helped was a first-of-its-kind choice by the Military Corps of Engineers introduced final month to permit the venture to function mitigation for environmental injury being attributable to the development of a significant levee venture close by, referred to as the West Shore Lake Pontchartrain hurricane safety system.
That can shave off a number of the invoice for the state’s 35% share of the price of the levee venture.
One other key was settlement cash associated to the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill, which pays for about two-thirds of the swamp venture. The state will cowl the rest.
The venture is a river diversion, however it differs enormously from the deliberate large-scale diversions aimed toward rebuilding coastal land. This one can be comparatively small, able to channeling as much as 2,000 cubic toes per second. Evaluate that to the capability of the Bonnet Carre Spillway, which may attain 250,000 cfs.
A brand new two-mile channel constructed close to Garyville will direct the water into the Hope Canal, then into an outfall space within the swamp north of Interstate 10. Building can be accomplished together with the close by levee venture and is anticipated to take about 4 years.
A distant monitoring system that sends real-time updates on the water high quality within the Maurepas Swamp on Friday, February 3, 2023. (Photograph by Chris Granger | The Occasions-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate)
The concept is to reconnect the swamp to the Mississippi River and the vitamins it as soon as supplied. The levees now maintain the river in place as an alternative of permitting its waters to overflow and its course to meander as occurred earlier in historical past – essential to hold the area from flooding, however badly damaging wetlands and coastal marsh.
Within the Maurepas Swamp, that has meant dying bushes, sinking land and a decline in wildlife.
The swamp has thinned out, with much less cover than it ought to have. The legendary duck searching of the previous is not any extra – an indication of deeper issues with the habitat.
‘An enormous deal’
The diversion will go a good distance in starting to nurse the swamp again, state officers and activists say. Its results can be intently monitored to find out whether or not it’s working as supposed.
“It is a large deal,” Alisha Renfro, a coastal scientist with the Nationwide Wildlife Federation, stated throughout a cease on final week’s boat tour of the swamp. “It’s 20 years within the making to really get us right here.”
Cypress and tupelo bushes mirrored within the Maurepas Swamp on Friday, February 3, 2023. Most of this area was deforested a long time in the past. The brand new Mississippi River diversion is anticipated to revitalize this space close to Gramercy. (Photograph by Chris Granger | The Occasions-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate)
Chris Macaluso, director of marine fisheries for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, spoke of the venture revitalizing an space simply accessible to residents within the New Orleans and Baton Rouge areas. Louisianans drive previous it on the I-10 on a regular basis with out realizing.
“I did loads of duck searching in these swamps round Sorrento, and it is a noticeably totally different habitat now than it was, say, 30 years in the past,” he stated.
However whereas those that have lengthy studied the swamp strongly again the venture, Shaffer notes bigger diversions can be wanted to extra absolutely restore wetlands there and within the wider Pontchartrain Basin.
Nonetheless, Shaffer stated, “it doesn’t matter what, it’ll assist quite a bit.”
Whereas the swamp has degraded through the years, it nonetheless affords placing views. Throughout final week’s tour, a flock of roseate spoonbills perched on tree branches. Close by, a rigorously maintained chapel referred to as Our Girl of Blind River stood on stilts, a statue of the Virgin Mary preserving watch inside.
Laramie Hill, 41, a business crabber in Lake Maurepas, remembers the tales his father-in-law used to inform him about trapping muskrat within the swamp.
“They’d crab and fish all summer season till round Thanksgiving, after which they’d simply full-time lure,” he stated, including that they’d additionally see 1000’s of geese, not like at this time.