The I. nelsonii Iris Restoration Can begin Now at the Abbeville Swamp

Abbeville, La. May 18, 2026

The Louisiana Iris Conservation Initiative's president, Gary Salathe, included the two slides shown below in a presentation he gave to the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana's (CRCL) Coastal Leadership Institute meeting at Palmetto Island State Park on Friday, May 15th. The slides show a zone that Salathe and his small band of volunteers have identified where irises could be planted now to help restore the extremely rare Abbeville Red iris within its native habitat in the Abbeville Swamp.

For the last two years, the group believed that before additional irises could be replanted in the swamp, small-scale water-control structures would first need to be installed to offset the large tidal range created by drainage improvement projects constructed in lower Vermilion Parish during the 1940s. Since the 1940s, extreme daily tidal swings have kept water levels too deep for irises throughout much of the swamp's interior.

In most areas of the Abbeville Swamp, periods of strong south winds regularly push water up the Vermilion River from the Gulf of America and into the swamp, making the water too deep to support irises. This photo was taken at low tide and shows the dark water mark on the trees from the previous high tide at approximately 30 inches deep.

While these water control structures would still provide the best long-term solution — allowing much larger portions of the swamp to once again support irises — multiple field investigations over the last three years led to an important discovery. Most of the remaining irises are surviving in small clumps within a narrow band of land along the swamp’s edges, generally ranging from 60 to 100 feet wide. The ground elevation in this zone is high enough that the irises do not go underwater during high tides, but low enough that the soil remains wet during low tides.

This slide was used by Salathe in his presentation to the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana's Coastal Leadership Institute to show how all of the irises found within the Abbeville Swamp are growing in a narrow zone located just inside the edges of the swamp.

In April, the volunteer team spent time walking this edge zone and determined that thousands — and possibly tens of thousands — of irises could eventually be planted within this long linear habitat on the property of the landowner they are working with. Two slides illustrated this newly recognized restoration potential.

This is the second slide of two that were included in a presentation on the Abbeville Red iris given to CRCL’s Coastal Leadership Institute’s meeting at Palmetto Island State Park on May 15th. The thin bright blue lines represent the zone where irises could be planted now as part of a restoration project in the Abbeville swamp. (The lighter the color of the ground elevations shown in the slide, the lower the elevation and deeper the water is at high tide. The darker green and yellow to red colors represent high and dry land.)

This discovery has energized the group’s efforts to accelerate seed collection and propagation work. Participating nonprofits are now germinating and growing large numbers of Abbeville Red irises for planting at the Palmetto Island State Park boardwalk swamp, where the irises are being allowed to grow and expand as a future source population for restoration plantings back into the Abbeville Swamp.

This photo was taken on 5-16-2026 at LICI's iris nursery in New Orleans where Abbeville Red irises are being grown from seedlings for planting into the Palmetto Island State Park boardwalk swamp later this year. There are currently 1,500 irises growing at the nursery.

The group now understands that future restoration plantings are no longer completely dependent on water control structures being installed first. Instead, large-scale restoration efforts in the Abbeville Swamp could begin as soon as enough irises are available for planting.

This photo was taken on 5-15-2026, showing a portion of the Abbeville Red Louisiana irises growing in the Palmetto Island State Park boardwalk swamp.

The long-term restoration plan is to relocate approximately 2,000 irises per year back into the Abbeville Swamp once the boardwalk swamp population reaches 5,000 established irises and an additional 2,000 new irises are added annually from the LICI nursery.