The fish could be causing major problems for Louisiana’s coastal fisheries in eight to 10 years if nothing is done.
Asian carp, including species such as bighead and silver carp, were introduced in the Midwest in the 1970s to clean murky fish farm ponds. The fish are filter feeders, munching microscopic plant and animal plankton from the water. Flooding along the Mississippi and Missouri rivers caused ponds to overflow, allowing Asian carp to escape into other rivers and reproduce in the wild.
These fish eat voraciously and reproduce rapidly. One fish reproduces three to four times a year, releasing between 100,000 to 3 million eggs each spawning, Parola said. They have no major predators and can eat more than 20 percent of their body weight in algae and plankton a day. Asian carp can weigh up to 100 pounds. With their large size and hunger for plankton, they could pose a threat to native species.
In 1980, Lake Peigneu, Louisiana disappeared into an underground vortex of doom.Actually, the accident was due to a math error, which resulted in one of the strangest oil drilling and salt mining accidents in U.S. history.
The Diamond Salt company had a huge salt mining operation under the lake. Meanwhile, Texaco Oil was drilling for oil from shallow platforms, which were built on the lake. Texaco roughnecks set a new drill a few hundred feet down, through the lake, through the lake bed, and into the earth. The drill bit hit one of the salt mine shafts, and the above disaster happened.
Just when you think it couldn’t possibly get worse, it does. The entire lake was sucked into the mine. The drill hole was originally 14 inches, but the force of the water expanded it to hundreds of feet across. At one point, a reverse water fall of 150 feet was formed because the Gulf of Mexico drained backwards (north!) into the lake. Watch the event unfold disaster on top of disaster. It is incredible. Via BoingBoing.
Rodents of Unusual Size is a new documentary on an invasive rodent called Nutria. Nutria’s grow to about 20 pounds(!) and are destroying critical wetlands in Louisiana. Click above to learn more.
Two financial deals that kept the National Football League playing in the Superdome, allowing New Orleans to host a 10th Super Bowl, were expensive for taxpayers and enriched Saints owner Tom Benson, said former Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco.
Taxpayers have spent at least $471 million on the Superdome since Hurricane Katrina, allowing a state reeling from the nation’s most-expensive natural disaster to keep its pro sports teams and rebuild a part of downtown destroyed by the 2005 storm. Benson, meanwhile, is worth $1.6 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, after acquiring the National Basketball Association’s New Orleans Hornets, a 26-story office tower that houses state agencies and a mall next to the stadium.
Louisiana cemeteries sinking, washing away. (Click for video). Some of the cemeteries were built above sea level, but marshy soils, tough hurricanes, and sea level rise are destroying the land.
Eleven cemeteries in Jefferson Parish have repeatedly flooded since Hurricane Katrina. In Lafourche, Terrebonne and Plaquemines parishes, more than a dozen others have succumbed to tidal surge. Some have more than 300 gravesites.
Officials say not much can be done to save the cemeteries or the sinking communities that surround them, though some towns have tried pouring concrete slabs to build up the burial sites and hold headstones in place. They’ve also anchored above-ground caskets to the slabs to keep them from floating off. USAToday
These types of stories are going to keep popping up in the next few years. Cemeteries, historic properties, naval yards, ports, bridge pilings, hotels, etc., anything close to the soft coastlines are going to get chewed up. And journalists will swarm to grab stories of nostalgia - “Mah grammie was buried in thar,” “I had mah first kiss in that thar light house,” “This hotel has been in operation since 1923. Important to the economy, you know. Now it’s lost to the sea.”
We know these things are going to happen. So who should pay to repair these structures?
Btw dear readers, I’m really (teeth-grindingly) annoyed I couldn’t embed this video from USA Today. They’re a great paper, way underrated imo. I’d share more vidoes and news from them, but their IT is out of touch. Does anyone know how to grab the embed code from the page script? Usually I can scrape the video code, but not with these guys. The url is here if you want to mess with it. Hit me up if you can help me!
Warning! Severe Tornado Outbreak Expected Christmas Day, Night, and Wednesday in the south
Christmas 2012 will not only feature heavy snow from Winter Storm Euclid. Severe thunderstorms and tornadoes will target parts of the South Christmas Day into Wednesday!
Here is the general forecast timing of this event:
Tuesday: Severe weather outbreak may begin before sunrise Christmas morning in east and southeast Texas into Louisiana. The severe storm threat spreads east, taking in the lower Mississippi Valley eastward into Alabama and the western Florida Panhandle by afternoon. Tornadoes, damaging winds of 60 to 80 mph, and large hail are all threats in these areas! Some tornadoes may be strong, long-track tornadoes, as well!
Full story, with tons of maps and surprising history of many Xmas tornadoes at Weather
Four people were rushed to a hospital Friday after an oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico some 17 miles southeast of Grand Isle, La., the U.S. Coast Guard told NBC News.
“Last year’s hurricanes and flooding not only engulfed homes and carried away roads and bridges in hard-hit areas of the country, it dispersed aggressive invasive species as well.
In Vermont, the floodwaters from Tropical Storm Irene and work afterward to dredge rivers and remove debris spread fragments of Japanese knotweed, a plant that threatens to take over flood plains wiped clean by the August storm.
The overflowing Missouri and Mississippi rivers last year launched Asian carp into lakes and oxbows where the fish had not been seen before, from Iowa to the Iowa Great Lakes. Flooding also increased the population along the Missouri River of purple loosestrife, a plant that suppresses native plants and alters wetlands.
“It’s quite an extensive problem around the country and it’s spreading,” said Linda Nelson, aquatic invasive species expert with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The agency’s budget for controlling invasive aquatic plants has grown from $124 million in 2008 to $135 million for fiscal year 2012.”
One of my favorite tumblrs, fertilizermarkets posted this video on EPA regulations and Louisiana poultry growers. The issue is water quality and chicken poop. Basically, the EPA regulates water quality, among other things.
To do this, the source of any water pollution is identified, and measures are taken to mitigate the impacts to the water. Sources vary, from mall parking lots to toilet water to coal plants to chicken growers. In the video, poultry farmers learn that chicken poop is a potential source of water pollution and that they’re responsible for where the poop goes.
One problem is that American farmers generallydon’t like to be 100% responsible for their waste (send me your hate mail here). And this irresponsibility manifests in a general disdain for the EPA and other “big government regulations.”
Lobbyists fuel this problem by creating confusion and uncertainty in the minds of farmers and politicians that represent them (which is, to my mind, an unethical exploitation and mental spoilage of otherwise good American people).
Anyway, the result is entrenched denial in its most brilliant form. And to me, it’s a fascinating artifact of American culture - to be both ‘personally responsible for self-actions’ yet eschew accountability when those responsibilities are not being met. Amazing to think about. This video follows standard journalistic tropes by showing “both sides” of the story. Good stuff.
Kristen Oaks shows us what #poultry growers can do to avoid a federal citation and fine due to new #EPA #regulations. This Week in Louisiana Agriculture.
Ellen and Brad Pitt walk around the 9th Ward, a neighborhood in New Orleans that was hit hard by Hurricane Katrina. Pitt’s non-profit “Make it Right” has helped build 75 sustainable homes that should be hurricane proof.
Chicago and the Gulf Dead Zone: NRDC Lawsuits Address Downstream Damage
The popular legend is that Chicago’s jazz tradition arose from a migration of musicians from New Orleans up the Mississippi River in the 19th century. It seems Chicago is now returning scat to New Orleans back down the Mississippi, but I don’t mean the vocal kind.
The Chicago area’s sewage has been found to be the biggest single contributor to the “Dead Zone” that has emerged in the Gulf of Mexico at the mouth of the Mississippi River – an area larger than the State of Connecticut where the oxygen levels in the water are so law that it can’t support life. The sewage contains phosphorus, a pollutant that acts like turbo-charged fertilizer fueling the growth of oxygen-depleting algae in the Dead Zone and elsewhere. - Read more in Ann Alexander’s Switchboard blog.
Did Google Maps quietly rollout a major imaging update? This is Louisiana, the Mississippi River and the delta, New Orleans, and some of the Gulf of Mexico. Clearest image I’ve seen of the area thus far.
Louisiana is in the midst of a land loss crisis that has claimed 1,883 square miles of land since the 1930s. Given the importance of so many of south Louisiana’s assets—our waterways, natural resources, unique culture, and wetlands—this land loss crisis is nothing short of a national emergency. If Louisianans don’t aggressively address this crisis, the problem intensifies. This analysis confirmed that if nothing is done, then the state could lose up to an additional 1,756 square miles of land. This land loss will increase flooding risk with disastrous effects.
The draft Master Plan is based on a two year analysis involving some of the state’s best scientists as well as national and international specialists. The plan also reflects feedback provided through extensive outreach activities, which involved participation by industry, civic associations, and community groups. The draft Master Plan presents a list of 145 high performing projects that could deliver measurable benefits to Louisiana’s communities and coastal ecosystem over the coming decades.”
A blog about the interactions between the built environment, people, and nature.
I'm a climate change consultant specializing in climate adaptation, environmental law, and urban planning based in the U.S. In addition to traveling and hiking, I research, publish, and lecture on how cities can adapt to climate change.
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