Bye Bye Marsh

  It makes me sad to see how my marsh is disappearing.  Little by little, bit by bit (ok, quite a few feet each year) the shoreline is eroded by waves.  A lot of this is caused by those dear, sweet little nutrias that infest the marsh.  The little ones are so adorably ugly until it is not funny.  (They are ugly simply because of their actions otherwise adorably cute.)  The nutria rats eat the marsh roots and kill off masses of the healthy marsh clumps.  With the marsh dying out, Fleabane has taken over huge sections of the area.  The nutria rats do not seem to find this plant palatable so it is reseeding quickly.  Fleabane is not as root sturdy as marsh grass so this opens the area up to mass erosion and thus a huge loss of land.  My property is shrinking as we speak!  

  I was on the pier yesterday when I noticed the waves beating against the shoreline.  Huge clumps of marsh were being toppled and washed out into the middle of the Bay.  Just this year alone, we have seen a loss of perhaps ten to fifteen feet of marshline.  Couple the voracious appetites of the nutria rats with the wash from high winds and an enormous problem emerges for folks like us that live right on the water. The wide line of marsh creates a natural barrier from storms.  Hurricane waters are buffered a bit before they reach inland.  With the possible threat of a hurricane out on the horizon, thoughts of protection never leave the brain.  My buffer zone has been greatly diminished since the last strong storm hit.  

  I am not sure just what can be done short of eliminating the nutria rats and trying to cultivate marsh.  I have always believed in the mantra of  "Live and let live" but the nutria rats are not keeping up their end of the deal!  They literally are going to eat themselves out of house and home!  Once the marsh is gone, the rodents will have to move to a new stomping ground.  By then, however, it will be too late for the Bayou. It is no wonder that some states offer a bounty for the rascals!  What to do, what to do?