LOUISIANA: Jean Lafitte National Historic Park and Preserve

Site Location & Description:

The Barataria Preserve unit of Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve, Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, between Marrero and Crown Point, fifteen miles south of New Orleans.

The park was established to preserve “significant examples of the natural and historical resources of the Mississippi Delta region....” The Preserve includes representative deltaic natural resources, and a thriving wetland ecosystem. Louisiana has not yet instituted an Important Bird Area program, but the site will be nominated and is eligible as a nationally Important Bird Area because of its importance as stopover habitat for hundreds of thousands of trans-gulf neo-tropical migrants. (Conclusion from NEXRAD radar and point counts.)

Ecological Values:

The Preserve hosts a highly diverse biological community with over 350 species of native vascular plants and 400 species of native vertebrate animals. It contributes organic carbon and nitrogen to the Barataria Basin, the largest and most productive estuary in the United States, and provides important nursery habitat for estuarine organisms.

Public Use and Benefit to the Community:

Proximity to the New Orleans makes it an ideal location from which to introduce visitors to the importance of the delta, and to the human alterations that threaten to overwhelm some of America’s most important wildlife habitat. There are about 200,000-250,000 visitors annually.

Threats:

Hydrological Modification: Previous land use altered the flow of freshwater and nutrients vital to downstream estuarine systems. Urban run-off is pumped into the Preserve. Hydrological restoration and management of run-off will be possible only when lands are in NPS control.

Ecological Disruption: Inappropriate water management, forest management, and hunting, trapping, or fishing practices remain potential threats. Wetland biotic communities on these tracts can best be managed if they are treated as a whole, rather than piecemeal on a patchwork of federal and private properties.

Land Loss: Erosion of fragile marsh soils is proceeding at a high rate along Lake Cataouatche, and there is evidence of interior marsh deterioration, perhaps brought on by damage from the exotic nutria. Measures to address these problems must await NPS ownership.

Oil and Gas (Mineral Estate): The oil and gas rights underlying these tracts are private. Because federal regulations apply only to land owned by NPS, acquisition is necessary so that minerals development can be accomplished without serious risk to park resources. At present, there are no active oil and gas wells on the property, but 3D Seismic exploration is underway. A dramatic resurgence of oil and gas drilling activity in coastal Louisiana is projected to continue.

Boundary Issues: The existing ownership pattern is non-contiguous, with federal and non-federal property interspersed. The area is entirely wetland, very difficult to patrol and post. The construction of the new Hurricane Levee along the boundary provides new means of ingress, and the lack of clear ownership and boundary lines makes effective protection of resources very difficult.

Acquisition Status:

Cost of complete acquisition is estimated to be $700,000. The Report Language for the 2005 Interior Appropriations bill includes: “the managers support land acquisition efforts at Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve…. The managers will look favorably upon future acquisitions at the park, should parcels become available.”

Public Support:

Orleans Audubon Society, Baton Rouge Audubon Society, Louisiana Audubon Council, Delta Chapter Sierra Club, League of Women Voters, Louisiana Wildlife Federation, Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, etc.

Habitat:

The Preserve contains an abandoned distributary formation of the Mississippi River delta, with natural levee crest hardwood forests, backslope bottomlands, baldcypress-water tupelo swamp, freshwater marsh, bayous, historic canals, ponds, and lakeshore.

The Preserve’s flotant or floating marsh makes up part of one of only four such large coastal floating estuarine freshwater marsh communities in the world. The floating marshes of the Barataria-Terrebonne estuary are the only example in the United States, and those located within the Barataria Preserve are the only such marshes in the National Park System. Most of the remaining acreage within the boundary is flotant, with adjacent areas of baldcypress swamp which provide vital hydrological connections to the marsh.

Species:

Alligator gar, bird-voiced treefrog, alligator snapping turtle, Gulf Coast box turtle, black-faced racer, red-shouldered hawk, barred owl, pileated woodpecker, nearctic river otter, etc.

Home to threatened & endangered species such as: American alligator, bald eagle, peregrine, brown pelican

Home to Audubon WatchList species: breeding: mottled duck, Swainson’s warbler, Prothonotary warbler, painted bunting; migrants: short-billed dowitcher; wood thrush; worm-eating, cerulean, bay-breasted, golden-winged, blue-winged, Canada, Kentucky, and prairie warblers; wintering: American woodcock, Nelson’s sharp-tailed sparrow; six other Watchlist species have been recorded as occasional visitors.