Climate change is causing significant degradation to the Mississippi River ecosystem.
Increased water and sediment delivery are making maintenance of the navigation channel difficult and diminishing the quality and quantity of critical backwater habitat.
Adaptation to these changing conditions requires optimizing connection between channels and backwater habitat, creating deep water refugia in backwaters, planning for increased navigation channel dredging, and making strategic infrastructure retrofits.
Many successful adaptations have been implemented on the Mississippi River, but more are needed to keep pace with the rate of ecosystem degradation resulting from climate change.
- Subject:
- Biology
- Environmental Literacy and Sustainability
- Environmental Science
- Life Science
- Material Type:
- Data Set
- Diagram/Illustration
- Author:
- Jeremy King
- Sara Strassman
- Shawn Giblin
- Date Added:
- 04/30/2024