Thoughts on CCA meeting tonight on state of Calcasieu fishery

[Smalls]

Originally Posted by MathGeek

Recognizing historical long term saltwater intrusion and land loss implicitly suggests fault with dredging such a deep and wide ship channel with inadequate mitigation strategies.

I feel it is important to note, lest someone try to take these words out of context, that the weirs were put in place as the mitigation strategy. Dredging operations and saltwater intrusion have continued, but from 1988-2004, marsh was gained. This was due to the system put in place.

Recognizing recent land loss and saltwater intrusion implicitly suggests poor weir management from 2005-2011.

I would partially agree with this. While the weirs were mismanaged from late 2005 through 2011, these were not the primary cause of landloss in the Cameron-Creole watershed. Many reports have been released on the land loss across the coastal zone from 2005 to 2008, and land loss across the entire coastal zone was substantial during this time. In the Chenier Plain, from 2004 to 2008, there was an approximate loss of 433 square kilometers (roughly 106,000 acres). So land loss was not unique to the Cameron-Creole, and the primary cause was not the weirs.

Now, switch the subject to salinity change in the Cameron-Creole, and you can attribute this to the mismanagement of the weirs. There was clearly a trend of freshening conditions in the Cameron-Creole after 1988. What is the one thing that changed? The installation and operation of the weirs.

Can some of the land loss from 2005-2011 be attributed to the weirs? Certainly, but I'm certain it is not the overwhelming majority of that, but more likely a small percentage.

[MathGeek]

Originally Posted by Smalls

Can some of the land loss from 2005-2011 be attributed to the weirs? Certainly, but I'm certain it is not the overwhelming majority of that, but more likely a small percentage.

You're probably right. Perhaps the more detrimental impact of leaving the weirs open from 2005-2011 is that it allowed anglers' skills to deteriorate as they became overly dependent on the effect of open weirs concentrating fish in locations were they were easy to find and catch.

Easy pickings at the weirs diverted angler attention from the destruction of essential oyster reef habitat on the E side (mostly summer 2010) and created the widespread misperception that wide open weirs are an essential part of sufficient forage in the lake, when the reality was more just making fish easy to catch.

The weirs were open far less in 2014, yet 2014 is the year where we've observed the best fish condition in specks and redfish. It seems that ample forage is entering the lake through the narrow fish slots, from the open Gulf, and being produced in the main lake itself without the need to put the marsh at risk with dangerously high salinities from keeping the weirs open.