Yearly archives "2018"

Morning Call Cafe

Yesterday we had the pleasure of meeting Mark Sanders, the founder of Basin Street Records. In nostalgic fashion, we met at the Morning Call Cafe, where Mark worked in 1978 and we had coffee and beignets for breakfast. He spoke to us about his label, the music industry in New Orleans, and his experiences with hurricane Katrina.

Mark started his record label in 1998. He worked with local jazz greats like Irvin Mayfield, Bill Summers, Kermit Ruffins, and Jason Marsalis. By 2005, the label had six full time employees and a work space. Then Hurricane Katrina struck Louisiana, bringing devastation and chaos to all aspects of life in New Orleans. Temporarily, Mark relocated to Austin, Texas. Despite losing the work space, his home, and many other obstacles, he stayed steadfast in his determination to pursue his passion and share the sounds of New Orleans with the world. He managed to keep the label alive by working out of coffee shops.

Since then, the label has made a miraculous rebound and seems to be as strong as ever. Currently, they have 3 full time employees and work out of Mark’s home. They are still putting out albums and finding fresh new artists that exemplify the spirit and resilience of New Orleans.

Team Turning: Carol Arceneaux: Buras Garden Planting

On Wednesday we had the pleasure of planting a garden for our friend Carol Arceneaux at his property in Buras.

Buras is on a thin strip of land between the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico. Since Katrina only about 10% of the population has come back.

Carol’s property has several concrete slabs where homes once stood, he tells us that he used to have several neighbors on all sides of him.

Other than Katrina, the residents of Buras have lost their homes to several other hurricanes, Buras has a levees one each side so that when water flows over them it essentials becomes a bowl and the water has no where to go.

We first dug the perimeters of the planting bed, and turned all the soil manually with shovels. We then spaced our vegetables apart, planted them and watered them.

The soil here is rich and is one of the many reasons why these wetlands were converted for agricultural.

Cause of Large Oil Refinery Flare-up

Upon crossing the Mississippi en-route to Mustard Seed Ministries, a large flare burned through the Louisiana sky.

While burning excess gases from oil production is a common theme in Southern California, I had never witnessed a flare of this magnitude and quite so close to ground level. Yet, this flare was relatively minute in comparison to the large off-gasing that occurred on March 10th.

To get the full story we visited Mark Schleifstein, Environmental Reporter at NOLA.com, formerly known as The Times Picayune. Mark explained that the source of the flare was the firm Chalmette Refining, LLC. According to Mark, the company claimed to have been performing routine maintenance when the large flare up occurred. In the midst of repairs, one of the compressors malfunctioned shutting down and shunting all gases to one of two emission stacks causing a large eruption of flames into the sky. While by law Chalmette is required to issue a report explaining what the cause of the flare was and what gases where release, the company has yet to do so. In the words of Mark Shchleifstein this behavior by the oil industry constitutes, “just another day in paradise” in Louisiana.

Link to NOLA.com article and footage of flare up.

Transect life

On a beautiful day, we headed out to do more transects in the Woodlands Trail Conservancy. After hacking our way through endless black berry we counted the various plant life

Woodlands Plantation

We visited the Woodlands Plantation this afternoon where we learned about the restoration and the historical purposes the buildings served. The original plantation was created in 1834 about ten miles away from its current resting place. The buildings that were reconstructed and preserved included Spirit Hall, the original plantation house, and the original slave quarters:

On the plantation we observed alligators that live on the land year round. The biggest one came out and seemed a bit curious about us too, with a little  coaxing  from Foster, the owner and preservationist of the land and area:

Foster also discussed his observations of the now plentiful black-bellied-tree ducks, which were not present in the area until about ten years previously. This invasive species is indicative of climate change, and can be found crowding the levees across the pond pictured above.

We also enjoyed a a crawfish boil, as seen below:

It was many of our first times enjoying this cultural activity, and the setting couldn’t have been more beautiful.

Survey plant species with Rainey

Deep in the woods our team headed by Rainey Barton we surveyed the various plants that make up the forested area of Southern Louisiana. We counted native and non native evasive plants to figure out what the composition of the forest is.

Day 3 of transect surveys.

The weather today was perfect and we ran into far less blackberry then we have on previous days. By this time we are all experts at identifying Elderberry and we most definitely all know what a blackberry looks like.