Terrebonne Basin

Under the marsh is a delta the Mississippi gave up on. The Terrebonne Basin is an abandoned delta complex whose soft, thick sediments keep compacting and sinking. Old distributary ridges left by past river channels run south from Houma to the Gulf, carrying sugarcane and pasture, with forested wetland in the lows. Four connected waters, Caillou Bay, Lake Pelto, Terrebonne Bay and Timbalier Bay, lie along the south. Levees that hold back river sediment starve the marsh, and Isle de Jean Charles has lost nearly all its land; funding to move its tribe inland came in 2016.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mandalay National Wildlife Refuge — 0.2 mi
  A 4,212-acre refuge of freshwater marsh and cypress-tupelo swamp southwest of Houma, with a nature trail to a boardwalk and observation deck and mostly boat-only access.
• Southdown Plantation and Terrebonne Museum — 4.0 mi
  A Greek Revival sugar plantation house in Houma, worked by 233 enslaved people by 1852, with the last Terrebonne mill's story and a worker's cabin of about 1885.
• Laurel Valley Village — 17 mi
  A sugar plantation's workers' village south of Thibodaux, with cabins of about 1845, shotgun houses, a store and cemetery, and the 1887 strike and massacre in the parish around it.
• Wetlands Acadian Cultural Center — 17 mi
  A Jean Lafitte National Historical Park center on Bayou Lafourche with Acadian and bayou-life exhibits, a 200-seat theater and ranger-guided boat tours to the E. D. White house.

More markers nearby

• Orange Grove — 3.5 mi
• Southdown Plantation — 4.0 mi
• Southdown High School — 4.2 mi
• YRF-4C Phantom II — 4.9 mi