South Louisiana is known across the world for its diverse ecosystem of wetlands, bayous and the delta of the Mississippi River. Such a unique environment comes with its fair share of challenges.
DredgeFest Louisiana, a weeklong symposium exploring the ramifications of human manipulation of sediment in the south Louisiana environment, was held at the University this week.
The University played host to various workshops to raise awareness of the issues of disappearing wetlands and the potential solutions being developed by scientists across the nation.
Bradley Cantrell, associate professor and director of the School of Landscape Architecture, said Louisiana was chosen as the site for DredgeFest because of its unique geography, and his department was eager to take part in the event.
“All dredging means is taking dirt from the river and moving it somewhere else,” Cantrell said. “This event is to raise awareness to a greater potential good we can do with moving the earth around.”
Cantrell said events of the week focused on ways to use dredged materials to help rebuild disappearing land in south Louisiana.
“Because the Mississippi River is being held in place by all these levees, it is not distributing sediment to the land surrounding the river and is causing erosion on a large scale,” Cantrell said.
Cantrell said solutions ranged from small-scale systems that alter the flow of sediment in the river to larger projects which would alter the design of levees to make them more friendly to the surrounding environment.
Brett Milligan, professor of landscape architecture at University of California-Davis, is one of the founders of the Dredge Research Collaborative, the main organization responsible for DredgeFest.
Milligan said hosting the event in Louisiana is special because sedimentary issues seem to be on the minds of its residents more than in other places.
“The Mississippi River is a massive watershed and drains a large portion of the United States,” Milligan said. “All that sediment is carried down here and has helped shape the culture and environment.”
Milligan said there has been a shift in thinking in regards to using dredged materials, and that is where the DRC is trying to make a difference.
“People have realized that dredged sediment is a resource that we can actually use to save the environment rather than just a mound of useless dirt,” Milligan said.
Milligan said as much as humans have altered the environment negatively, we have the potential to make it right.
“DredgeFest is designed to help us be more aware of the changes humans have made and to bring together the people who know how to solve these problems,” Milligan said. “We can work more intelligently and better affect the environment around us; that is what we’re all about.”

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Lauren Duhon

Tega Brain answers questions about a dredge model Thursday, Jan. 16, 2014 as part of the DredgeFest Louisiana symposium in the Design Building.