re: Gating canals in houma area

Fair enough.

The whole situation with oyster fisherman hating sediment diversions is somewhat similar to the gating topic. Bad press and twisting of facts have led to the negative connotation diversions oftentimes receive.

Oyster fisherman are currently using areas that were historically freshwater for their harvest (due to the drastic change of the coastal landscape over the past 60-75 years obv.) and feel as though diversions will ruin their fishing grounds. In actuality some of the places they now fish were land or totally fresh water as little as 20-30 years ago. The reality is that while oyster fisherman will have to travel farther than they currently do to gather oysters, without some serious changes to they way our shoreline is being managed, oyster farmers will have no where left to go for their catch. However, I must divulge here that I am totally unfamiliar with how oyster farmers acquire the rights to fish the land they use for harvest, this will most likely be where the majority of the conflict stems from. I'd love for someone informed on here to shed a little light on that area.

I am pro-sediment diversions, (not to be confused with freshwater diversions, which do have their own, separate place i.e. Caernarvon, Davis pond, Maurepas etc.) I think sediment diversions are truly the only chance we have to save the coast, because they work passively to restore the natural balance we lost when levees were built in the early half on the 20th century. We have one of the most powerful land building resources in the entire world in the Mississippi river and to not harness it, in my own mind is lunacy. I'd like to start a topic on this issue sometime next week to get opinions from other angles though. I'm only looking thru my own lenses