Caddo Lake ecological-flows workshop set for Oct. 3 and 4
Scientists, water managers, community members pioneer methodology
for means to ensure adequate water for people and wildlife
San Antonio, Texas—September 29, 2006—Scientists, water managers and others interested in the future ecological health of water resources from Texas, Louisiana and across the nation will gather with local community members for the third time in Jefferson Oct. 3 and 4 to study the process for enhancing water flows to Caddo Lake from Big Cypress Bayou and other tributaries of the lake.
Organized by The Nature Conservancy and the Caddo Lake Institute, the ecological-flows workshop will examine technical aspects of biology, hydrology, hydraulics, geomorphology and water quality – called the building blocks of ecological flows – with the ultimate goal of determining how much water is needed to maintain the ecological health of Caddo Lake and its tributaries as habitat for animals and plants while supplying adequate water for human needs such as drinking water and recreation.
Caddo Lake Institute President Richard Lowerre said that the workshops at Caddo Lake represent the leading edge of a new round of planning Texans are undertaking to manage water resources under increasing demand from growing populations. “People who care about our rivers, lakes and other water resources are realizing we need to understand how these water systems work to determine how we can make the best use of what we have,” he said.
Ecological flows are much on the minds of Texas water experts these days. The Texas Environmental Flows Advisory Committee was created in October 2005 to establish a process that will achieve a consensus-based, regional approach to integrate environmental flow protection into the water allocation process while assuring that human water needs are satisfied. The committee is poised to make recommendations in late November or early December for action and legislation concerning flow allocation to meet human and environmental needs in time for the next session of the Texas Legislature in January 2007.
Ryan Smith, a freshwater ecologist with the Conservancy’s Texas Program and workshop participant, said, “We are looking to achieve ecologically sustainable water management in a process that is both science based and stakeholder driven.” The upcoming workshop, he added, will address two major issues. One is to align the Caddo Lake process with the framework being used to determine statewide environmental flow protection. Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the Texas Water Development Board, in cooperation with other agencies, are currently establishing an instream flow data collection and evaluation program and are conducting studies to determine methodologies for determining flow conditions for rivers and streams. These agencies also are participating in the Caddo workshops.
The second is to expand the workshop’s perspective beyond maintaining ecological flows in Big Cypress Bayou to the other major tributaries to Caddo Lake, including Black Cypress Bayou and Little Cypress Bayou. The flows-ecology workshop also will serve as the hydrology working group for the Watershed Protection Plan for Cypress Basin. A stakeholders’ meeting for the Watershed Protection Plan will take place on Oct. 26.
Texas’ only natural lake, Caddo Lake covers 50 square miles, half in Texas and half in Louisiana. Believed to have been created originally by logjams on the Red River, the lake and its surrounding wetlands are a mixed bottomland hardwood forest and shallow bald cypress swamp. Long regarded as one of the best remaining examples of this forest type, the area was declared the United States’ thirteenth Wetland of International Importance by the Ramsar Convention, an intergovernmental treaty for protecting exemplary wetland systems. With its maze of bayous and cypress swamps, Caddo Lake and its surroundings support the richest array of aquatic creatures in the area, with more than 20 mussel species and 90-plus species of fish, including uncommon species such as the paddlefish.
The Conservancy has been working to protect Caddo Lake since the early 1990s and was instrumental in the creation of Caddo Lake Wildlife Management Area. The organization also owns and manages the 1,000-acre Fred and Loucille Dahmer Preserve at Caddo Lake. The Caddo Lake Institute has been working with the local communities to protect Caddo for the past 15 years.
The workshops originally were developed through The Nature Conservancy’s Sustainable Waters Program, developed to help protect freshwater ecosystems by advancing water policies that secure adequate water flows in rivers, lakes and wetlands. Caddo Lake and Big Cypress Bayou are part of the program’s Sustainable Rivers Project, a pilot project with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer to protect river ecosystems downstream of multiple dams in 13 states. The Caddo workshops began with an orientation conference in December 2004.
The first ecological-flows workshop was held in May 2005, drawing more than 80 participants, who surveyed the scientific information available, set priorities for data collection and research to fill knowledge gaps, and looked at the challenges and opportunities of implementation and determined next steps.
Lowerre and other Caddo Lake conservationists note that while there is no immediate threat to water resources at Caddo Lake, the time to plan for its future is now. “We need to be smart about planning for future use,” Lowerre said. “It makes sense to look at what’s going on in the watershed affecting flows, water quality, sedimentation and other issues.”
The consensus among workshop participants is that the restoration of the timing, magnitude and duration of ecological flows in Big Cypress Bayou is critical to Caddo Lake’s sustainability. To learn more about the flows-ecology workshops, visit www.caddolakeinstitute.us/FallFlows.htm.
Sources for reporters:
Caddo Lake Institute: Richard Lowerre, president, (512) 350-6960.
The Nature Conservancy: Jim Bergan, Ph.D., Texas director of science, (210) 224-8774, ext.
220, (210) 241-0228 cell; Dan Weber, northwest Louisiana program director, (318) 549-2686; and Ryan Smith, freshwater ecologist, (210) 224-8774, ext. 226, (210) 563-3677 cell.
Texas Environmental Flows Advisory Committee: Dick Bartlett, member and Caddo Lake resident, (903) 679-4242.
Images for Download:
Caddo Lake - © Leroy Williamson (JPG, 373kb)
Caddo Lake - © Lynn Mc Bride (JPG, 4973kb)
Caddo Lake - © Lynn Mc Bride (JPG, 449kb)
Caddo Lake - © Lynn Mc Bride (JPG, 334kb)
Caddo Lake - osprey (Pandion haliaetus), © Lynn Mc Bride (JPG, 286kb)
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The Nature Conservancy is an international, nonprofit organization that preserves plants, animals and natural communities that represent the diversity of life on Earth by protecting the lands and waters they need to survive. To date, the Conservancy and its nearly 1 million members have been responsible for the protection of more than 15 million acres in the United States and have helped protect more than 102 million acres in Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacific. In the Lone Star State, The Nature Conservancy of Texas owns 35 nature preserves and conservation projects and assists private landowners to conserve their land through more than 70 voluntary land-preservation agreements. The Nature Conservancy of Texas protects 250,000 acres of wild lands and, with partners, has conserved close to a million acres for wildlife habitat across the state. Visit The Nature Conservancy of Texas on the Web at nature.org/texas.
Caddo Lake Institute (CLI) is a non-profit scientific and educational corporation with the mission of protecting the ecological, cultural and economic integrity of Caddo Lake, its associated wetlands and surrounding communities. CLI is proud of the relations with many people and communities whose goals are protection of this unique treasure that is Caddo Lake – and the success that the joint efforts have brought. For example, Caddo Lake has been designated a Ramsar “wetland of international importance.”
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