Download or read book Living with the Louisiana Shore written by Joseph T. Kelley and published by Living with the Shore. This book was released on 1984 with total page 186 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nowhere in America is there a more beautiful, more varied, or more endangered shoreline than in Louisiana. Because of its setting at the mouth of the Mississippi River, Louisiana differs from other coastal states. In addition to long stretches of sandy beach there are 12,000 square miles of marsh along the coast. Although the state's shoreline has not yet experienced the urban sprawl of a New Jersey or Florida, two-thirds of all Louisianans now live within a two-hour drive of salt marsh. The oil industry is expanding and competing for space and resources. But the most striking feature of Louisiana's coastline is rapidly accelerating change, which means (1) some coastal parishes may literally disappear by the year 2000; (2) the loss of marshland will damage the prolific seafood industry; (3) a retreating coastline could cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenues from offshore oil facilities; (4) present and potential shoreline residents will face many new problems and possibilities.
Download or read book Bayou Farewell written by Mike Tidwell and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Cajun coast of Louisiana is home to a way of life as unique, complex, and beautiful as the terrain itself. As award-winning travel writer Mike Tidwell journeys through the bayou, he introduces us to the food and the language, the shrimp fisherman, the Houma Indians, and the rich cultural history that makes it unlike any other place in the world. But seeing the skeletons of oak trees killed by the salinity of the groundwater, and whole cemeteries sinking into swampland and out of sight, Tidwell also explains why each introduction may be a farewell—as the storied Louisiana coast steadily erodes into the Gulf of Mexico. Part travelogue, part environmental exposé, Bayou Farewell is the richly evocative chronicle of the author's travels through a world that is vanishing before our eyes.
Download or read book The Louisiana Coast written by Gay M. Gomez and published by Texas A&M University Press. This book was released on 2008-10-09 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hurricane Katrina gave the nation an urgent reminder of the extent and value of Louisiana’s wetlands when daily discussions of subsidence and sedimentation revealed how much ordinary coastal processes affect humanity—and vice versa. Now, with a native Louisiana naturalist as a guide, readers can learn how best to enjoy, appreciate, and protect this vanishing landscape. Part natural history and part field guide, The Louisiana Coast takes readers across one of only three major chenier plains in the world to the Atchafalaya Basin, the largest river basin swamp on the continent, and through the network of bayous, natural levees, cypress swamps, marshes, and barrier islands of the Deltaic Plain. Color photographs illustrate chapters on vegetation, wildlife, and the rich human culture that defines Louisiana. With the intimate knowledge of one whose life has been shaped by this remarkable environment, author Gay M. Gomez leads visitors to nature trails, wildlife refuges, Audubon sanctuaries, and parks. A visitor’s guide at the end of the book features destinations open to the public for wildlife watching, photography, and even hunting, fishing, crabbing, and cast netting. Everyone who lives in or visits Louisiana and anyone interested in the conservation, ecology, natural history, and geography of the region will appreciate Gomez’s exploration of the land, its people, its resources, and its vulnerabilities. The Louisiana Coast will encourage readers to share the author’s love for this vital, distinct, and beautiful place.
Download or read book Drawing Louisiana s New Map written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2006-02-23 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the past 50 years, coastal Louisiana has suffered catastrophic land loss due to both natural and human causes. This loss has increased storm vulnerability and amplified risks to lives, property, and economies-a fact underscored by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Drawing Louisiana's New Map reviews a restoration plan proposed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the State of Louisiana, finding that, although the individual projects in the study are scientifically sound, there should be more and larger scale projects that provide a comprehensive approach to addressing land loss over such a large area. More importantly, the study should be guided by a detailed map of the expected future landscape of coastal Louisiana that is developed from agreed upon goals for the region and the nation.
Download or read book Rising written by Elizabeth Rush and published by Milkweed Editions. This book was released on 2018-06-12 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Pulitzer Prize Finalist, this powerful elegy for our disappearing coast “captures nature with precise words that almost amount to poetry” (The New York Times). Hailed as “the book on climate change and sea levels that was missing” (Chicago Tribune), Rising is both a highly original work of lyric reportage and a haunting meditation on how to let go of the places we love. With every record-breaking hurricane, it grows clearer that climate change is neither imagined nor distant—and that rising seas are transforming the coastline of the United States in irrevocable ways. In Rising, Elizabeth Rush guides readers through these dramatic changes, from the Gulf Coast to Miami, and from New York City to the Bay Area. For many of the plants, animals, and humans in these places, the options are stark: retreat or perish. Rush sheds light on the unfolding crises through firsthand testimonials—a Staten Islander who lost her father during Sandy, the remaining holdouts of a Native American community on a drowning Isle de Jean Charles, a neighborhood in Pensacola settled by escaped slaves hundreds of years ago—woven together with profiles of wildlife biologists, activists, and other members of these vulnerable communities. A Guardian, Publishers Weekly, and Library Journal Best Book Of 2018 Winner of the National Outdoor Book Award A Chicago Tribune Top Ten Book of 2018
Download or read book America s Wetland written by Mike Dunne and published by LSU Press. This book was released on 2005-11-01 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With America's Wetland, award-winning photographer Bevil Knapp and veteran reporter Mike Dunne sound the clarion call of the catastrophic effects of Louisiana's vanishing coastline -- not just for Louisiana but for the nation and the world. This vital landscape known as America's Wetland is currently disappearing at a rate of twenty-four square miles per year and could lose another five to seven hundred square miles in the next fifty years if no action is taken. New Orleans could become "America's Atlantis," one of the country's unique cultures lost forever. Knapp's beautiful, sometimes startling photographs and Dunne's incisive commentary bring the urgency of this problem into full view. Documented here is a way of life that is quickly waning. Fishermen, oyster farmers, cattle ranchers, oil industry workers, shipbuilders, and tugboat captains are all heavily dependent on Louisiana's coastal territory in bringing the people of the United States a host of products and services sometimes taken for granted. Home to nearly two million residents, the state's wetland serves as protection from hurricanes and storm surges and acts as a buffer for the city of New Orleans, identified by the National Hurricane Center as the city most threatened by the loss of America's Wetland. The book makes clear that as coastal erosion in Louisiana worsens at an alarming rate, the nation's economic and energy security is put at ever-higher risk and the environmental repercussions become unthinkable. Aerial photographs show how the oil and gas infrastructure is becoming increasingly exposed to the Gulf. Wells, pipelines, ports, roads, and levees that are key to delivering energy to the nation have been made vulnerable. Louisiana wetlands are the natural nursery ground for much of the country's seafood and the wintering habitat for more than five million waterfowl and migratory birds. Stunning photographs of owls, pelicans, egret, crab, crawfish, and alligators illustrate the vast array of wildlife whose home -- if not very survival -- is endangered by the possible collapse of this intricate ecosystem. America's Wetland not only maps the causes and effects of Louisiana's diminishing coast but also outlines restorative and conservation initiatives such as tree planting, rebuilding fisheries, and setting aside wildlife refuges. With the active support of all Americans, there is still hope that this imperiled border of the country can be saved.
Download or read book Wild Life Resources of Louisiana written by Henry Hazlitt Kopman and published by . This book was released on 1921 with total page 174 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Living Beaches of the Gulf Coast written by Blair Witherington and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2022-12-01 with total page 425 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle beckon curious beachcombers with miles of wave-swept Gulf coastline. These beaches offer more than a sandy stroll amidst stunning scenery—they are alive! As ever-changing ribbons of sand, these beaches foster unique life-forms and accept beguiling castaways from a vast marine wilderness. Mysteries abound. What is this odd creature? Why does the beach look this way? How did this strange item get here? Living Beaches of the Gulf Coast satisfies a beachcomber's curiosity within a comprehensive yet easily browsed guide. The guide is written in a familiar style and is illustrated with distribution maps and hundreds of color photos. Accounts include beach anatomy, coastal phenomena, and shoreline animals, plants, and geology. Hundreds of seashells are depicted as well as other interesting animals, flowers, historical structures, beach sands, and beach art. The authors suggest a variety of beach scavenger hunts and recommend hints for beachcombing success.
Download or read book Ain t There No More written by Carl A. Brasseaux and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2017-02-06 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 2018 Louisiana Literary Award given by the Louisiana Library Association For centuries, outlanders have openly denigrated Louisiana's coastal wetlands residents and their stubborn refusal to abandon the region's fragile prairies tremblants despite repeated natural and, more recently, man-made disasters. Yet, the cumulative environmental knowledge these wetlands survivors have gained through painful experiences over the course of two centuries holds invaluable keys to the successful adaptation of modern coastal communities throughout the globe. As Hurricane Sandy recently demonstrated, coastal peoples everywhere face rising sea levels, disastrous coastal erosion, and, inevitably, difficult lifestyle choices. Along the Bayou State's coast the most insidious challenges are man-made. Since channelization of the Mississippi River in the wake of the 1927 flood, which diverted sediments and nutrients from the wetlands, coastal Louisiana has lost to erosion, subsidence, and rising sea levels a land mass roughly twice the size of Connecticut. State and national policymakers were unable to reverse this environmental catastrophe until Hurricane Katrina focused a harsh spotlight on the human consequences of eight decades of neglect. Yet, even today, the welfare of Louisiana's coastal plain residents remains, at best, an afterthought in state and national policy discussions. For coastal families, the Gulf water lapping at the doorstep makes this morass by no means a scholarly debate over abstract problems. Ain't There No More renders an easily read history filled with new insights and possibilities. Rare, previously unpublished images documenting a disappearing way of life accompany the narrative. The authors bring nearly a century of combined experience to distilling research and telling this story in a way invaluable to Louisianans, to policymakers, and to all those concerned with rising sea levels and seeking a long-term solution.
Download or read book Perilous Place Powerful Storms written by Craig E. Colten and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2010-06-30 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The hurricane protection systems that failed New Orleans when Katrina roared on shore in 2005 were the product of four decades of engineering hubris, excruciating delays, and social conflict. In Perilous Place, Powerful Storms, Craig E. Colten traces the protracted process of erecting massive structures designed to fend off tropical storms and examines how human actions and inactions left the system incomplete on the eve of its greatest challenge. Hurricane Betsy in 1965 provided the impetus for Congress to approve unprecedented hurricane protection for the New Orleans area. Army Engineers swiftly outlined a monumental barrier network that would not only safeguard the city at the time but also provide for substantial growth. Scheduled for completion in 1978, the project encountered a host of frustrating delays. From newly imposed environmental requirements to complex construction challenges, to funding battles, to disputes over proper structures, the buffer envisioned for southeast Louisiana remained incomplete forty years later as Hurricane Katrina bore down on the city. As Colten reveals, the very remedies intended to shield the city ultimately contributed immensely to the residents' vulnerability by encouraging sprawl into flood-prone territory that was already sinking within the ring of levees. Perilous Place, Powerful Storms illuminates the political, social, and engineering lessons of those who built a hurricane protection system that failed and serves as a warning for those guiding the recovery of post-Katrina New Orleans and Louisiana.
Download or read book Saving Louisiana written by Bill Streever and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2001 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "From the Mississippi River's Old River Control Structure to the pipeline canals of the Gulf's oil fields to the capitol in Baton Rouge, Saving Louisiana? follows scientists, conservationists, and politicians, as they persistently ask the same question: Can Louisiana's coastline be saved? For some experts, technical uncertainty impedes progress. For others, bureaucracy and special interests block what they see as the right path. Still others believe that the real challenge lies in determining what society really wants, so that ecosystem restoration becomes a balance of dollars against choices. Saving Louisiana? builds a story of doubt and discord that captures the technical and human drama of ecosystem restoration and management"--Publisher website (March 23, 2009).
Download or read book Louisiana s Response to Extreme Weather written by Shirley Laska and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2019-11-12 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is open access under a CC BY 4.0 license. This book takes an in-depth look at Louisiana as a state which is ahead of the curve in terms of extreme weather events, both in frequency and magnitude, and in its responses to these challenges including recovery and enhancement of resiliency. Louisiana faced a major tropical catastrophe in the 21st century, and experiences the fastest rising sea level. Weather specialists, including those concentrating on sea level rise acknowledge that what the state of Louisiana experiences is likely to happen to many more, and not necessarily restricted to coastal states. This book asks and attempts to answer what Louisiana public officials, scientists/engineers, and those from outside of the state who have been called in to help, have done to achieve resilient recovery. How well have these efforts fared to achieve their goals? What might these efforts offer as lessons for those states that will be likely to experience enhanced extreme weather? Can the challenges of inequality be truly addressed in recovery and resilience? How can the study of the Louisiana response as a case be blended with findings from later disasters such as New York/New Jersey (Hurricane Sandy) and more recent ones to improve understanding as well as best adaptation applications – federal, state and local?
Download or read book Fly Fishing the Louisiana Coast written by Pete Cooper and published by Countryman Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A complete guide to fly fishing and visiting the hundreds of miles of bayous, coastlines, and the Mississippi River Delta.
Download or read book The Control of Nature written by John McPhee and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2011-04-01 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While John McPhee was working on his previous book, Rising from the Plains, he happened to walk by the engineering building at the University of Wyoming, where words etched in limestone said: "Strive on--the control of Nature is won, not given." In the morning sunlight, that central phrase--"the control of nature"--seemed to sparkle with unintended ambiguity. Bilateral, symmetrical, it could with equal speed travel in opposite directions. For some years, he had been planning a book about places in the world where people have been engaged in all-out battles with nature, about (in the words of the book itself) "any struggle against natural forces--heroic or venal, rash or well advised--when human beings conscript themselves to fight against the earth, to take what is not given, to rout the destroying enemy, to surround the base of Mt. Olympus demanding and expecting the surrender of the gods." His interest had first been sparked when he went into the Atchafalaya--the largest river swamp in North America--and had learned that virtually all of its waters were metered and rationed by a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' project called Old River Control. In the natural cycles of the Mississippi's deltaic plain, the time had come for the Mississippi to change course, to shift its mouth more than a hundred miles and go down the Atchafalaya, one of its distributary branches. The United States could not afford that--for New Orleans, Baton Rouge, and all the industries that lie between would be cut off from river commerce with the rest of the nation. At a place called Old River, the Corps therefore had built a great fortress--part dam, part valve--to restrain the flow of the Atchafalaya and compel the Mississippi to stay where it is. In Iceland, in 1973, an island split open without warning and huge volumes of lava began moving in the direction of a harbor scarcely half a mile away. It was not only Iceland's premier fishing port (accounting for a large percentage of Iceland's export economy) but it was also the only harbor along the nation's southern coast. As the lava threatened to fill the harbor and wipe it out, a physicist named Thorbjorn Sigurgeirsson suggested a way to fight against the flowing red rock--initiating an all-out endeavor unique in human history. On the big island of Hawaii, one of the world's two must eruptive hot spots, people are not unmindful of the Icelandic example. McPhee went to Hawaii to talk with them and to walk beside the edges of a molten lake and incandescent rivers. Some of the more expensive real estate in Los Angeles is up against mountains that are rising and disintegrating as rapidly as any in the world. After a complex coincidence of natural events, boulders will flow out of these mountains like fish eggs, mixed with mud, sand, and smaller rocks in a cascading mass known as debris flow. Plucking up trees and cars, bursting through doors and windows, filling up houses to their eaves, debris flows threaten the lives of people living in and near Los Angeles' famous canyons. At extraordinary expense the city has built a hundred and fifty stadium-like basins in a daring effort to catch the debris. Taking us deep into these contested territories, McPhee details the strategies and tactics through which people attempt to control nature. Most striking in his vivid depiction of the main contestants: nature in complex and awesome guises, and those who would attempt to wrest control from her--stubborn, often ingenious, and always arresting characters.
Download or read book A Moveable Shore written by Peter Charles Patton and published by Durham : Duke University Press. This book was released on 1992 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Connecticut shoreline is made up of varying landscapes--the sandy coastline at Madison, the rocky shore at Branford, the replenished beach at Greenwich, and the erosion at Old Saybrook. A Moveable Shore offers a general user's guide to the Connecticut shore. In a town-by-town journey down the 254-mile coastline, Peter C. Patton and James M. Kent explore in detail the history of specific sites, the climatic and geological forces that shape the shore, and regulations regarding land-use development. In addition, they provide a guide to coastal field trips. Beginning with the hurricane of 1938, the biggest natural disaster to strike Connecticut since its settlement by Europeans, the authors demonstrate the continuing pattern of development of coastal land prone to flooding and high winds. Although the Connecticut coast faces Long Island and Block Island sounds, it is subject to the same natural hazards, land-use risks, and regulations as opean ocean shorelines. Global climatic events--glaciation, global warming, and rising sea levels--influence the shape and composition of the Connecticut shoreline, as do small-scale forces such as wind, waves, and tides. Patton and Kent seek to instill a respect for the force of natural events and provide a guide for lessening the dangers of construction and development. A practical question-and-answer chapter explains what homeowners need to know to meet land-use regulations along the coast. In a state where the entire population lives within 100 miles of the coast, this important book will serve as a citizens' guide to living with the Connecticut shore and will be of interest to coastal residents, developers, geologists, policymakers, and vacationers.
Download or read book Boundaries of the Coastal Zone written by National Ocean Survey. Office of Coastal Zone Management and published by . This book was released on 1975 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Field Guide to the Southeast Coast Gulf of Mexico written by Noble S. Proctor and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2011-01-01 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: DIVA uniquely comprehensive and beautiful guide to more than 600 species of fauna and flora along the coasts of the southeastern United States and the Gulf of Mexico/div