Wetlands are good.
Wetlands are great.
Swamps and marshes both.
That’s what we used to call them,
‘Swamps and marshes’.
Just now, wetlands.
I’ve been hunting and fishing
As long as I remember,
And no one likes wetlands
More than I do.
But Louisiana’s wetlands aren’t disappearing
Just because of the Old River Control Structure.
Read the newspapers.
We’ve got experts
Behind every tree –
Professors, government scientists, et cetera,
Who all think they know what’s wrong
With Louisiana’s wetlands.
You look at the facts,
Size everything up
And the picture gets blurred.
Maybe it’s the Old River Control Structure.
Maybe it’s oil field canals,
Or sea level rise,
Who knows what else.
And it’s not just in the Delta
That the wetlands are disappearing.
Up and down the river
The bottomlands are gone.
And not just here,
All along the Quachita River, too.
Take a ride along any river
Or bayou in Louisiana
And it’s the same thing.
But people want something to blame.
And we've got the big structure right here.
This big chunk of concrete and steel
Out here in the middle of nowhere
Run by the government.
What a great thing to have.
Adapted from Bill Streever (2002): Chapter One “The End of Deltaic Birth?” in Saving Louisiana: The Battle For Coastal Wetlands (pp. 14-15). Jackson: University Press of Mississippi.
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