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- We're on a borrow pit
along the Mississippi River

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mainline levee in
Ascension Parish, Louisiana

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as part of an aquatic study
for the Mississippi River

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levees Supplemental EIS for 2019.

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And this study is an
extension of an earlier study

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that was done in the late 1990's and also

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part of a supplemental EIS.

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The difference today is that we have

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much better technology to
help us collect these data

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and we can now let an
autonomous underwater vehicle

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collect the water quality data throughout

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the entire borrow pit,
whereas before we would

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have to take transects
or profiles to be able to

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quantify the water quality
parameters within these pits,

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and that is enabling us
to much more precisely

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and comprehensively map the value of these

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aquatic areas for fishes,
macro-invertebrates,

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and other organisms.

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This is part of the active floodplain

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and even though borrow pits
are man-made water bodies,

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they still function because they're still

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connected to the river
and they function as

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spawning areas and rearing areas for

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fishes that utilize backwaters
of the Mississippi River.

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Even though the mainline
Mississippi River levee

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has reduced the historic
floodplain from about

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20 million acres to
currently 2 million acres,

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it's still 2 million acres
of very high quality habitat.

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It is the largest active
connected floodplain

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in a US river system.

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One other piece of very
important information

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that we're getting from this is the impact

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of big-headed carps on these areas

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because the data from previous
studies were collected

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before the introduction,
the widespread introduction

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of big-headed carps into this system,

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and this is sort of an
indirect, big picture way

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to look at the impacts of those species

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on the fish assemblages and the

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general productivity of these backwaters.

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These are highly productive backwaters

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and they support massive growth

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and reproduction of these invasive carps,

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so understanding how that affects

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the bigger picture of the
ecosystem is very important.

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- Historically, we've taken
water to water quality

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measurements over time
at surface and bottom,

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with the EcoMapper I
can now take thousands

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of water quality points
in a matter of hours.

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For example, the system that
we're on today is 50 acres,

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we were able to collect
the bathymetry, turbidity,

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conductivity, temperature,
and pH in one swoop.

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We're not just using the EcoMapper
to collect water quality,

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we're tying to fish assemblage.

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So we're going out and
we're using more primitive

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technologies, gillnetting and seining,

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and then we're tying it
in with some of the most

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state-of-the-art equipment in the world.

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The ERDC fish ecology
team is able to translate

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these micro-habitat features
into fish ecology values

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which is really a unique capability.

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- So using the points that you can map,

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as Alan said, gathers thousands of points,

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so we can take those into RTIS and create

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a continuous surface
so this continual layer

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that overlays this borrow pit,

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of dissolved oxygen or
chlorophyll or turbidity,

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which are important metrics to fish.

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Focusing on dissolved oxygen,

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the thing that we can
do is if we look at that

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point cloud of dissolved
oxygen and look for

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a range of DO that's important
to us, specific fish species,

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or to the fish assemblage as a whole,

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we can estimate the volume of water

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where the dissolved oxygen is high enough

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to support those fish
that we're interested in.

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That can then be translated
into management measures.

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We can change the
connectivity of the borrow pit

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to allow fresh water to flow in and create

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a little bit of flow
which will improve the DO.

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We can add more tree cover
along the outside edges

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of the borrow pit because that tree cover

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will shade the borrow pit
that algae won't grow as fast

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and that algae, although it
produces dissolved oxygen

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during the day, at night
it sucks all that oxygen up

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and then there's no oxygen for the fish.

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So there's specific management measures

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we can implement in this borrow pit,

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but also throughout the
Mississippi floodplain as a whole,

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from this data we're
gathering from the EcoMapper.

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- One of the big benefits
to doing this study is that

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not only are we repeating a study

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from 20 years ago so
it's directly comparable,

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we're also collecting additional data

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that allows us to input these water bodies

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into our larger ecohydrology database,

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so the larger study of the connectivity

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of these water bodies is still lie within

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the active floodplain
to the Mississippi River

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and assess their value on a larger scale.

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So our ecohydrology study is looking at

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the frequency of connection
of water bodies within

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the active floodplain that
are at different elevations,

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so depending on your hydrograph,

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different water bodies
will connect to the river,

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to the main channel, for a
different period of time,

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a different time of the year
and somehow flow through,

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and some are backwater connections only.

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And fishes and macro-invertebrates,
and other organisms

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utilize all of those different
habitats differently.

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So, understanding that is a
way to get a bigger picture

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and a more comprehensive picture of the

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greater Mississippi River ecosystem.

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(outro music)