Caminada Headlands Back Barrier Marsh Creation Project (BA-0171) – 2024 detailed habitat classification

The Caminada Headland Back Barrier Marsh Creation Project was developed under the Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection, and Restoration Act (CWPPRA) to create and/or nourish approximately 900 acres of back barrier marsh behind nearly 8 miles of beach with dredged material from the Gulf of America. This restoration effort created a platform for the beach and dune to migrate, reducing the likelihood of breaching, increasing retention of sediment that has been over-washed, protecting wetland and developments, and slowing the trend of lost land. For more information on this restoration effort, see CWPPRA BA-171 fact sheet.

The products created in this data release are detailed habitat maps using the Barrier Island Comprehensive Monitoring (BICM) Program processes and schema. These maps are used to monitor post-restoration habitats to ensure resiliency and sustainability of ecosystem structure, function, and services over time. The BICM program has developed two habitat classification schemes which include a detailed 15-class scheme and a general eight-class scheme. The additional classes developed in the detailed scheme are primarily used to further delineate various dune habitats, separate marsh and mangrove, and distinguish between beach and unvegetated barrier flat habitats. To ensure comparability between this effort and previous BICM map products, we have crosswalked the detailed classes to general habitat classes previously used by Fearnley and others (2009).

The general habitat classes represented in these products were not directly interpreted from aerial imagery or lidar elevation data. Thus, we recommend only using these general habitat classes for analyses that include previous BICM habitat maps (1996–2005). For more information about the BICM program, see Kindinger and others (2013). For more details on BICM habitat classes, see the Entity and Attribute Information section of the metadata. Please consult the accompanying readME.txt file for information and recommendations on the contents of this dataset (i.e., dataset and recommended symbology). For more information about the BICM program, see Kindinger and others (2013).

References:
Kindinger, J.L., Buster, N.A., Flocks, J.G., Bernier, J.C., and Kulp, M.A., 2013, Louisiana Barrier Island Comprehensive Monitoring (BICM) program summary report—Data and analyses 2006 through 2010: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 2013–1083, 86 p., at https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2013/1083/.

Fearnley, S., Brien, L., Martinez, L., Miner, M., Kulp, M., and Penland, S., 2009, Chenier Plain, South-Central Louisiana, and Chandeleur Islands, Habitat mapping and change analysis 1996 to 2005, Part 1—Methods for habitat mapping and change analysis 1996 to 2005—Louisiana Barrier Island Comprehensive Monitoring Program (BICM) 5: New Orleans, University of New Orleans, Pontchartrain Institute for Environmental Sciences, 11 p.

Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection, and Restoration Act, 2023, Caminada Headland Back Barrier Marsh Creation (BA-171): Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority Fact Sheet, https://www.lacoast.gov/reports/gpfs/BA-171.pdf.