around the Southlands: Consider the dolphins

Yet another Mississippi River lawsuit, and other news

Carey Akin

Thanks to my long essay on chestnuts, I bumped this news roundup back a few days. Attentive readers will also note a slightly different format, with longer write-ups. If you have thoughts about the best approach to these updates, I’d love to know!

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🐬 One more Missississippi River lawsuit

During the long flood of 2019, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had to keep the Bonnet Carré Spillway open for months, steering millions of gallons of river water away from New Orleans—and into Lake Pontchartrain, and from there into the Mississippi Sound. That had a devastating effect on local fisheries.

A year ago, a federal judge ruled that the Corps would henceforth have to consult with fisheries officials before opening the spillway in question. Now, the same coalition of Mississippi groups and governments that won that suit has filed again—this time claiming that, since freshwater can be deadly for dolphins, operation of the river’s flood control system constitutes a violation of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Per the Biloxi Sun-Herald:

In 2019, 166 dolphins washed up on Mississippi shores, either dead or unable to return to the water, the lawsuit says. It was the highest number ever recorded, the lawsuit says, with the second-highest number recorded in 2011, when 147 dolphins were stranded during another flood year with high levels of river water pouring through the spillway.

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🚜 Failing farm chemicals

A few years back, when I wrote about a murder inspired by a fight over the herbicide dicamba, my big worry was less about violence than about the future of farming: our system of chemical agriculture looked like an arms race against nature we were bound to lose. Plants evolve chemical resistance faster than we can keep up. Recently, Reuters offered some worrisome confirmation. The news service…

interviewed two dozen farmers, scientists, weed specialists and company executives and reviewed eight academic papers published since 2021 which described how kochia, waterhemp, giant ragweed and other weeds are squeezing out crops in North Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota as chemicals lose their effectiveness.

Given the intense agriculture conducted in the South—and the fact that herbicide-resistant weeds have been found here, too—local farmers ought to be paying attention.

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🐊 Atchafalaya controversies revived

Louisiana’s Atchafalaya Basin holds the country’s largest remaining river swamp. It’s also one of the most engineered landscapes in the country—which makes its management complicated. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers recently issued a permit for the long-debated East Grand Lake project. The environmental nonprofit Atchafalaya Basinkeeper has vowed to make stopping the project its top priority in 2024.

+ A few years back, I dug into the Atchafalaya Basin for the Bitter Southerner. There is a real history of corruption in the region, but what ecological future is best for these swamps is a subjective question, I concluded.

+ bioGraphic goes deep on the past and future of the Riverkeeper movement.

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🐻 Bears, beware

I noted in my last email that there’s an effort afoot to cancel the newly approved Louisiana black bear hunting season. Per reporting in Nola.com, “opponents have also been flooding the inboxes of [the state’s wildlife] commissioners.” But at public meetings, the sentiment has mostly gone the other way, it seems:

“I’m disappointed you are only talking about 10,” said J.T. Strong, a pastor and hunter, referring to the state’s proposal that would allow 10 bears to be killed in the proposed hunting season.

According to the complaints of many in northern Louisiana, the bears have become a nuisance, chewing through diesel lines on farms.

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🚧 Pipeline politics

On paper, the Mountain Valley Pipeline seems like a done deal: the work is 94% complete. But activists, Grist reports, see reasons to keep fighting.

The pipeline is six years behind schedule, about half a billion dollars over budget, and, despite promises that it would be done by the end of last year, delayed once again. The remaining construction is over rugged terrain, with hundreds of water crossings left to bridge. The company recently postponed, shortened, and rerouted its planned extension into North Carolina, a proposal long stymied by permitting problems with the main line. And, just last month, Equitrans, which owns the pipeline and many others across the country, was said to be considering selling itself.

Part of the idea here is that even if this pipeline isn’t stopped, continued action might make the project such a headache that companies will think twice before pursuing anything similar again.

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Quick links

90 legislators support protection for Georgia’s Okefenokee

Louisiana farmers discussing climate change

Is the Alabama shad endangered?

A remarkable year for Chesapeake oysters

The Gulf dead zone persists

Meet Crystal, Louisiana’s great white shark

Turning Kentucky coal sites into solar farms

Country stars are buying Field & Stream

Meet Louisiana’s new coastal chief

Southern salamanders (and a bumblebee) may soon be listed as endangered