Community-Based Restoration Projects Rebuild Wetlands
Citizens Take on the Fight for the Coast

An acre every 38 minutes. Nearly 2,000 square miles in the last century. The alarming rate and immense scale of Louisiana’s land loss can seem too large a challenge for any project or entity to affect.

But as three Louisiana organizations prove, motivated citizens can make a difference through projects big and small that restore coastal habitats.

Raising the Reefs

Reefs, the foundation of the marine food chain, provide hard-structure habitat for a variety of organisms, including algae, soft corals and oysters. As crabs, shrimp and crustaceans congregate near reefs to feed on plants and small invertebrates, they attract popular game fish like trout and redfish.

“Reefs are vital to Louisiana’s fisheries, but across the coast hard-structure habitat is eroding and subsiding,” says John Walther, artificial reef coordinator for Coastal Conservation Association– Louisiana (CCA). The CCA replaces some of that lost habitat with artificial reefs built from small chunks of limestone.

Scheduled for construction in summer 2007, a 2.5-acre reef in the Turner’s Bay area of Calcasieu Lake will be the group’s third and its largest yet. It may also become the first artificial reef in Louisiana made from concrete slabs donated by local manufacturers. The shrimping industry is concerned the slabs will snag and damage nets,” but we will mark the reef so shrimp boat captains can steer clear,” Walther says. “Environmentally friendly, concrete will allow us to build large, long-lasting reefs to support our recreational fisheries.”

From Advocacy to Action

Alarmed by the decline in Vermilion Bay’s recreational fishing, six Abbeville businessmen and public officials formed the Louisiana Wetlands Association (LWA) in January 2005. “Our goal was to increase public understanding of and support for restoration efforts in Vermilion Parish,” says Russell Gaspard, the LWA’s secretary. “We wanted to be an advocacy and awareness group.” But as the LWA’s membership grew, so did its ambitions, and within a year the group had secured a grant to build an oyster reef in Prien Point, a mile south of North Lake. Public and political support for the project was overwhelmingly positive, Gaspard says. Three local restaurants contributed 200 cubic yards of oyster shells to form the reef’s foundation. An oyster-fishing family offered to help the LWA harvest live oysters to jump-start the reef habitat. Legislation suspending restrictions on bringing the oysters into the bay allowed the group to build a reef instantly alive.

“Within two weeks, people were catching fish off the reef,” Gaspard says.

Terraces Tame Turbulent Waters

Across broad expanses of wetland, wind-driven waves disturb the mucky bottoms of open-water areas. The resulting turbidity — suspension of sediment and other particles in the water — keeps sunlight from penetrating the water column and prevents the growth of a primary food source for many duck species, submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV).

“If we can reduce turbidity in these areas, we can encourage sediment accretion and SAV growth,” says Chad Courville, regional biologist with Ducks Unlimited (DU).

To calm the waters in a Cameron Parish marsh, a 2002 DU restoration project built earthen terraces in zig-zag fashion across large, shallow ponds. “This ‘duck-wing’ design means that regardless of wind direction, there will always be calm water on one side of the terrace, allowing sediment to settle and the water to clear,” Courville explains. As plants colonize the accreted sediment, they hold it in place, eventually building new marsh that provides food for wintering and resident waterfowl as well as habitat for shrimp, crabs and fish.

“Because our state is losing habitat very quickly, we’re engaged in projects that restore wetlands today,” Courville says. “But DU’s goal for coastal Louisiana is long-term sustainability. Working with communities, corporations and state and federal agencies, we are building support for public policy that protects the future of our coast.”