Wiers Opening?

[Duck Butter]

Originally Posted by noodle creek

Also, DB, why aren't there weirs on east bank of Sabine Lake? The marsh over there looks pretty dang healthy to me w/out weirs. Are you 100% sure that the duck grasses in the marsh behind the weirs would not have come back if the weirs weren't there?

I do not know why there are no wiers over there, I thought someone said there were actually wiers on that side? Wiers would have to be installed by someone's request, guess whoever owns land there didn't request a wier to be installed? Are you talking about Sabine NWR?

(duck grasses coming back) - No one can predict what would happen if wiers were or were not there with 100% accuracy. But we KNOW that there is a timeframe (or threshhold) where brackish marsh can withstand a certain salinity for a certain amount of days before it dies (many papers published on this). Same with many plants and other environmental factors there are studies that show exactly how many days a certain plant can be overtopped with water before it dies. I want to say bald cypress seedlings are like 90 days overtopped before they die, but anyways I have a paper around here somewhere talking about salinity threshholds on plants see if I can dig it up later


edit: hold on a minute I read over this

"Also, DB, why aren't there weirs on east bank of Sabine Lake? The marsh over there looks pretty dang healthy to me w/out weirs"

Correct me if I am wrong but isn't the outlet of Sabine (Sabine Pass) a natural waterway? Ship Channel in Big Lake is not natural, Sabine Pass is natural or is at least shallower than the Ship Channel correct?

Your answer is a manmade Ship Channel vs a natural pass what we have been discussing since page 1 (until W got us all sidetracked!)

map of Louisiana marsh types, Sabine side appears to be intermediate marsh as Calcasieu is brackish, and they are two totally different animals
http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2008/1224/pdf/OFR2008-1224.pdf