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A Picture is worth at least 50 words. A View from Above gives more space to photos we at GRN take while monitoring wetlands, pollution, and the Gulf of Mexico.
photo overflight thanks to On Wings of Care
A delta splay was created in the wake of the Flood of 2011, via a diversion project on the Mississippi River.
Less than two years after the flood, migrating white pelicans can be seen using the land.
The state of Louisiana, in coordination with several federal agencies and NFWF, is planning on building 7-8 diversions. This one, Caernarvon, was engineered not to build land, but to get Freshwater to ailing Oysters--and not move sediment that would compromise oyster beds.
And yet, the diversion has built land. But because it wasn't designed to do so, the land came at a large cost to the bayside fishery.
Tthis gift of flood protection for new orleans came at dear a price for some saltwater fisheries. Future diversions like the Myrtle Grove Sediment Diversion seek to minimize this price by building the gates of the diversion over the sand bed, and opening the gates only during times of high energy, on the rising flood stage. Because they are designed to build land by moving the least water possible, they can restore the earth with a smaller impact to the sea.
[click on image below to see it full screen]
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8106/8506207048_a5cfe6304f_h.jpg
photo overflight thanks to On Wings of Care
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