The wetlands of southern Louisiana and their drainage . t part is not cutup to any extent by bayous, although the tract includes a lake with an areaof nearly 5 square miles. The greatest problem to be solved in the reclamation of this tract is the pro-tection against storm tides. The maximum rise in tide at this point is between5 and 6 feet. This is higher than any on record for a period of about 100 yearsprevious to the storm of September, 1909, this maximum height. Area No. 6 contains 2,000 acres of open grass-covered prairie taken from theabove-described tract of land and in addi
The wetlands of southern Louisiana and their drainage . t part is not cutup to any extent by bayous, although the tract includes a lake with an areaof nearly 5 square miles. The greatest problem to be solved in the reclamation of this tract is the pro-tection against storm tides. The maximum rise in tide at this point is between5 and 6 feet. This is higher than any on record for a period of about 100 yearsprevious to the storm of September, 1909, this maximum height. Area No. 6 contains 2,000 acres of open grass-covered prairie taken from theabove-described tract of land and in addition contains 500 acres of a river-front plantation. It is so located that an addition to it can be made on thewest side if the pumping plant proves larger than necessary. 46 BULLETIN 71, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. Levees. The levee on this tract has been raised to a height of about 7 feet above meantide level. The work was done with an orange-peel-bucket dredge, with a 70-foot boom. This allowed a berm of about 20 feet between the levee and the. CANAL- ,del. -u- 1000 0 1000 5000 10000 FEET Fig. 14.—Sketch map of area No. 6, Poydras, La., showing ditch and levee systems. canal. As shown in figure 14, all levee canals are on the outside, as the mate-rial was considered to bG too soft to permit placing of the canal inside the dis-trict, and thus use it as a reservoir canal. By locating these canals on the DRAINAGE OF WET LANDS OF SOUTHERN LOUISIANA. 47 outside they will be made useful for navigation. For the most part there wasno preparation of the base of the levee, for when the first few dippers of ma-terial were placed in the levee it cut very deeply into the muck and formed agood bond with the underlying silt. In placing the first layer no attempt wasmade to get much above 3 feet in height, but a wide base of 60 feet was securedfor the remainder of the levee. In crossing some old drainage canals that hadbeen cut for about 40 years, a decided difference was noted
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