The Untold Story - Disappearing Louisiana Wetlands

south Louisiana is a place unlike almost anywhere else on earth endless maze of beautiful grasslands and coastal wetlands I hope that it's strong enough to survive this Venice Louisiana is affectionately call at the end of the road and sometimes the end of the world Venice is one of the places where you're really starting to see the impacts of what's going on with this oil spill a lot of these people all they've ever known was being an oyster vendor in an offshore fisherman there being a commercial fisherman harvesting shrimp in the marsh coasts Louisiana's wetlands were built over roughly a six thousand year period in 1927 there was a huge flood Mississippi River area in Bali and caused a massive devastation of homes and property at that point it was decided that the levees needed to be built to provide flood protection for all these communities up and down the river downside of those changes on the Mississippi River were that effectively the sediment supply the lifeline for these coastal wetlands was severed when you look at the wetlands in relation to migratory birds and the habitat it provides it really gives you an idea of how connected this landscape is Louisiana's wetlands serviced wintering or stopover grounds for roughly 10 million migrating birds and waterfowl every year 90% of the animals that live in the Gulf of Mexico it's been some part of their life cycle in these coastal estuaries some of the best times I had grown up were out in the marsh running around with my dad trying to find fish the effects of this oil spill they're not yet fully realized and it's something that I fear will have significant long-term effects you

Channel: Environmental Defense Fund

Views: 21,765

Rating: 4.6756759 out of 5

Keywords: oil spill, oilspill, bp oil disaster, bpoildisaster, gulf coast, wetlands, edf, nwf, environmental defense fund, national wildlife federation

Id: 0cdHZD-2oMU

Length: 1min 59sec (119 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 02 2010