From all indications this year appears to be the best I have seen since Y2K.
The tupelo are refoliating and blooming too, and the Bald Cypress are starting to really turn green as well.
A couple of weeks ago, the swamp was still mostly grey with moss being the predominant color factor.
And the White Ibis were really coming into the rookery to roost at sunset.
If you would like to view them,
you can go to Lake Martin Landing just before sunset any day,
and there are 20-30 thousand flying over the landing from the north to roost.
What is really interesting is how evident the floating mat of plants is as a foundation of the nesting birds food supply,
(as seen below, where Ibis are feeding on aquatic snails, shrimp and crawfish)
yet the Nature Conservancy continues to support the policy of spraying herbicide to decrease the plant mass as seen in the 3 photos below taken in the rookery at the Cypress Island Preserve on Sept. 28, 2010. The state with the Nature Conservancy's approval came out and sprayed around and in the rookey last year two times in September.
In spite of the fact that three sides of Lake Martin has been sprayed so much
that the ecology is in my opinion completely destroyed, there doesn't appear to be an end to this insanity. I thought the Nature Conservancy policy was protection of plants and wildlife and preservation of ecology.
That's right three sides of Lake Martin no longer has the floating mat of plants it once had and almost all the button bush was destroyed as a non targeted casualty of the war on plants that has gone on for 15 years.
You can see the evidence of this overkill in the photo below where floating mats of plants and button bush once were as thick as they are in the rookery today.
If I got this right it would appear that certain individuals are being decieved or perhaps bought and used to promote the chemical company agenda of selling chemical products to the state government at tax payer expense to create profit for the chemical company. If the plants were ever a threat, that threat ended over ten years ago when we wiped out the hundreds of acres of pennywort, frogbit, trifolium, and button bush on the north side of the lake.
The noth side of the lake is now in my opinion an aquatic desert compared to what it was 12 years ago when glossy ibis regularly visited their feeding grounds there.
Hopefully the emerald green that is emerging now will be here for our appreciation of the natural beauty of the swamp, as well as the nutrient value it brings to the ecology of all species, especially the birds, throughout spring and into the summer.
My Louisiana swamp tours have been a great source of inspiration and pleasure for many people for over 25 years and
in spite of 15 years of plant control, 5 major hurricanes in five years and an oil spill last year,
it would appar that the birds are back in record numbers and I will be here to watch over and defend the ecology and all species therein, as I conduct my tours. What has made my swamp tours special amoungst the 50 or so such companies in Louisiana is Lake Martin. de la Houssaye's Swamp Tours is still the premiere tourist attraction in the tri-parish area primarily due to the abundance and variety of plants, birds and alligators present in Lake Martin.
If you would like to come out and see the birds and alligators from Rookery Road(no charge), you can go to my site for directions, by clicking the link at the bottom of my new Lake Martin Swamp Tours site.
You can make a reservation for a swamp tour with me by calling my cell phone @ 337 298 2630.
If you are out at the lake touring, hiking, kayaking, fishing, birdwatching or doing photography, and begin to feel the hunger pains, I want to refer you to a really neat little restaurant on the main drag from Interstate 10 leading into Breaux Bridge at 124 Rees Street.
It is called Le Cafe.
Now I can imagin you may have been eating too much fried food lately, but if that is what you are looking for, these folks do it right.
Just my opinion, but this is the place for shrimp poboy in Breaux Bridge!
You can call them at 332 2500 and order in advance and pick it up at the drive through. Nice...
As you can see, there is a lot more to the menu than just shrimp.
This is not a fast food restaurant, so call in advance if you are in a rush or be prepared to sit and wait for them to cook your order, and that is what makes it so good.
Along with the fact that it is cooked to order, they bread their own and that is how it is supposed to be done.
They are located at the corner of Rees and Thibodeaux streets in Breaux Bridge.
