Selected Views of Life on the Delta

 The Sprawling 12 room house we Earth Watchers call home, research lab and learning center.

 This is the top of the levee that keeps the Mississippi River to the right of the line of trees out of the strip of land at ground zero of the eye of hurricane Katrina at Port Sulfur and Empire, Louisiana in the delta. Levee is around 12 ft high and 20 ft of water came over this levee and made one giant wet land for a couple of weeks. This strip of land is the only land left in this area of the Delta.

 The Delta is part of the Wintering grounds of this juvenile loon which hatched out of a nest somewhere in northern US or most likely Canada. This is some of the first work done on these wintering loons which are flying 1500 to 2000 miles back to their birth place in the next few weeks.  It will be a couple more years for this bird to find a mate and nest.

 This is what remains of the Delta which were just a few years ago Spartina (emergent vegetation) wetlands. Only a few islands of Spartina sp. remain. Water depth is 3-4 feet here. The boat is an oyster boat. The pvc pipes sticking out of the ground indicate artificial oyster beds which are being harvested. The loons dive this water all day long for fish, crabs, shrimp and who knows what. This is new study work.

The sediment from the Mississippi River about 3 miles to the right behind the levee and locks brings sediment to the Delta.  There isn't enough sediment to maintain the bottom of this huge delta to allow the spartina to emerge from the bottom. The sediment is many feet thick weighing down upon itself squeezing out the water between the particles of soil from the Midwest US river systems. The squeezing out of the water compacts the sediment and it sinks below the surface of this Gulf of Mexico water or in relative terms the sea level is rising in comparison to the land.  Oil from the Gulf of Mexico moved into all of this watery ecosystem and interacted with every living thing. Current research is trying to access the effects. It will take years to determine the effects. Dolphins were reported by NOAA to be very ill in a report released yesterday.  http://www.nola.com/environment/index.ssf/2012/03/dolphins_in_barataria_bay_poll.html