News release Public Information Office  SLU 10880   Hammond, LA 70402   phone: 985-549-2341   fax: 985-549-2061 publicinfo@selu.edu Spring 2004 news releases Public Information home News archive Contact: Rene Abadie Date: 4/15/05   ECOLOGIST TO ILLUSTRATE HISTORICAL LOUISIANA COAST IN MARITIME MUSEUM PRESENTATION        HAMMOND -- A view of coastal Louisiana from the late 1600s to the early 20th century will be presented by LSU coastal ecologist Richard Condrey at the spring educational meeting Wednesday (April 20) of the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Maritime Museum in Madisonville.        The lecture is free and is scheduled for 7 p.m. at the museum, 133 Mabel Drive in Madisonville. Roy Blackwood, Southeastern Louisiana University educational liaison with the museum, said Condrey’s talk will be a voyage of discovery, viewing the coast of Louisiana as it was in 1680 to 1930. “It is Condrey’s firm belief that unless we understand the past, we cannot plan a better coastal future for ourselves and our children,” Blackwood said.        Condrey’s talk is entitiled “Bison on the beach, parakeets in the cypress: An ecological history of the Louisiana coast from Barroto to Fonville.” An associate professor in the LSU Department of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences and the Coastal Fisheries Institute, he holds a doctorate in fisheries from the University of Washington.        “When Europeans began to settle among the Native Americans in coastal Louisiana, they found bison running on the beach, parakeets singing in the cypress, and a vast delta filled with stacks of driftwood and protected by miles of offshore oyster reefs,” Condrey said. “As they conquered this wilderness, they recorded with their best scientific precision and awe the magnificent forces that were building and maintaining this last natural delta of the Mississippi.”        Condrey notes that Louisiana faces an environmental and social crisis as it attempts to restore its coast. “We will bring to life these valuable lessons from the past while eliciting from the audience a better understanding of the vessels and scientific instruments that would have been used in the coastal surveys of Louisiana during this period.”        For more information, contact the museum at 985-845-9200.