Most of Louisiana's Rabbit Island was flooded in 2020; after crews restored 102 acres of nesting habitat, birds built more than 11,600 nests in the first season

Rabbit Island in southwestern Louisiana had spent years losing ground to the sea. The island's edges eroded steadily, high tides pushed across its center, and ship traffic from an adjoining channel accelerated the damage. According to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, by 2020 most of the island was submerged or flooded on a regular basis, leaving it unsuitable for nesting. Restoration crews then built 102 acres of new nesting habitat on the island. Experts had projected around 370 nests would appear there in the first year; more than 11,600 were recorded instead, over 30 times the original estimate.

Why this island matters

Readers who followed the news in 2010 may recall the Deepwater Horizon oil spill; the Rabbit Island project traces directly back to it. The restoration was designed to create nesting habitat that would help offset the harm done to colonial waterbirds by that spill. The site holds the only brown pelican colony in southwestern Louisiana, making it a clear example of the long-term work required to make up for damage caused by environmental disasters.

On a larger scale, over the years between 1932 and 2016, Rabbit Island has been part of an issue that has caused the Louisiana coast to lose around 25% of its 1932 land area, as noted by a 2017 U.S. Geological Survey report titled “Land area change in coastal Louisiana (1932 to 2016).” That report found that Louisiana loses more coastal wetland than any other state in the lower 48 combined, and while the rate has slowed since peaking in the mid-1970s, the loss has not stopped.

How the rebuild worked

By the time restoration began in 2020, the island had already lost 89 acres, which is about 35% of its original land area, to erosion, per the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. Much of what remained wasn't dry land in any reliable sense either: it was the same frequently tide-flooded ground described above, which is why the project called for raising new terrain rather than simply reinforcing what was there.

Crews built up elevation using sediment dredged from the Calcasieu Ship Channel and planted more than 65,000 plants, including smooth cordgrass and marsh elder. Of the 102 restored acres, 81 were designated as colonial waterbird nesting habitat, supporting species including brown pelicans, egrets, herons, ibis, terns, and skimmers, while the remaining 21 acres were set aside as secretive marsh bird habitat, according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.

Rock baskets and oysters

Once the restoration was complete, trustees noticed the same erosive forces wearing away at the island's new earthworks, causing significant erosion within parts of its structure. In late 2023, engineers finished installing 810 wire-mesh rock baskets, each filled with limestone and weighing 3,000 lbs, along the island's northeastern edge to cut down on erosion and storm surges.

That limestone doubles as a surface young oysters can attach to, and the project drew on guidance and expertise from The Nature Conservancy. The approach appeared to work. During a spring 2024 visit, staff found hundreds of brown pelicans nesting over newly laid eggs.

A good sign, not a final grade

That 2024 check-in remains the most recent public update on the island's progress, and officials have been careful to treat one strong season as encouraging rather than conclusive. The structure is expected to keep generating marsh habitat for fish, birds, and other wildlife over time, per the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, as silt builds up behind the baskets and vegetation takes root. Rabbit Island's early results were striking, but they're also a reminder that restoring a coastal habitat is measured in years and decades, not single seasons, and that the work, even years on, is still being watched and reinforced.