Coastal Prairies
(Area - 7,344,300 ha)
Description - The Coastal Prairies physiographic area covers approximately
880 km of coastal shoreline from Atchafalaya Basin, Louisiana to Baffin Bay, Texas. The
inland boundary of this area ranges from 15 km to 150 km from the coast, capturing a
complex of marshes and upland grassland and a very small amount of forested habitat. Marsh
vegetation is determined largely by the salt content of the water, with community types
ranging from salt marsh to brackish to fresh water marsh. Nearly all grassland habitats
have been converted to agricultural use, primarily pasture lands and rice farms. Forested
areas occur primarily along major riverine systems and on coastal cheniers (ancient
beachfront ridges), mottes and salt domes, and man-made levees and spoil banks. The
Chenier Plain is an important sub-unit of the physiographic area that is located from
Atchafalaya Bay, Louisiana westward to East Bay, Texas. Wooded subunits comprise only
about 6% of the Chenier Plain and occur on the cheniers themselves. These are long narrow
bands of woodlands dominated by hackberry and live oak that run parallel to the Gulf Coast
and range in width from about 30 to 500 m and in length from about 1 to 50 km. Bottomland
hardwood forests along the major river systems that drain the Coastal Prairies range in
composition from cypress-tupelo to hackberry-ash-elm to water oak-willow oak dominated
forests.
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Conservation recommendations and needs - Most of the natural communities of the Coastal Prairies physiographic area have experienced tremendous alteration. Marsh habitats have been lost or changed because of saltwater intrusion caused by oil and gas development, dredging, channelization, impoundments, land subsidence, and other factors. As much as 99% of the original prairies and grasslands have been converted to agriculture. Cattle are commonly grazed in marsh, grassland and wooded habitats, further degrading bird habitat. Invasion by non-native plants, such as Chinese tallow, has changed diverse natural habitats to monotypic stands covering hundreds of hectares. Continuing human development of higher ground is likely as human population pressures increase.
Although pressures on bird habitats are tremendous, there are opportunities for implementing bird conservation actions. Most of these actions will require proactive, cooperative approaches with private landowners and strong private lands incentive programs. In ricefields and other wet agricultural areas, bird conservation goals include a process to identify potential sites for intensive management of priority species assemblages, acknowledge/educate/inform rice and crawfish farmers of their opportunities to create spring, fall, and winter shallow water habitats, and monitor the trend of rice acreage conversion to other crops that are less valuable for waterbirds. The Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection, and Restoration Act has improved coastal marsh and estuary conditions in Louisiana. Marsh restoration projects, including freshwater diversions, are of priority action. Increased funding following this model would provide opportunity to prioritize degraded areas with the best bird conservation potential and start restoration projects in these areas. A policy of no net loss of forested wetland and chenier acreage would be of primary importance to bird conservation. The quality and composition of these habitats should be improved by decreased grazing in woodlots and active non-native plant removal programs.
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