NYC plantings finally in!

After much coordination of our schedules with that of NYCDEP, we were finally able to complete our plantings into Jamaica Bay. It would have been nice to get them in last fall or even this past winter, but it wasn’t to be…

On April 9th Steve, Kim and I planted 2,100 plants gathered from Mulford and Orient Points into 11 separate 1m2 plots. We had hoped to have more donor material, but the fact that the plants were so small this time of year made collection difficult. We planted 6 plots at Breezy Point, 3 at Floyd Bennett Field and 2 at Little Egg Marsh. Plots were set out perpendicular to shore and started just below MLW and went out to ~3ft at MLW. All plots were marked with a labeled stone at the center and we kept the Mulford and Orient shoots separate so that we might be able to tease out donor population effects.

The weather was very cooperative and we met John McLaughlin of NYCDEP and Robert Will of the Army Corp of Engineers at the old Coast Guard Station west of the Marine Parkway Bridge at 8:30am for a day on the water. A NYCDEP boat came to pick us up soon thereafter and we were on our way. It was a little breezy, but coming from the SSW meant that we were protected for most of our work.

We had planned to work during the ebbing tide and end up at Breezy Point, at or around low tide. This worked out well as we arrived at this site at 1:15am and we were able to observe the full extent of the flats at low tide. After laying out the six plots here, the three of us began planting and we finished some time around 2:30pm. Steve installed an OnSet temperature logger adjacent to the deepest plot and we were on our way.

One troubling observation as we were heading back to the dock was the fact that we saw a number of brant feeding almost exactly on top of our shallowest plot at Breezy Point. We fully expect to loose this plot to something, maybe exposure or erosion, but I didn’t think it would be to Brant! There is no guarantee that they did rip out the plants, but I will be very surprised if any remain in this plot when we return in May. I just hope they haven’t moved out to the deeper plots…

I’ll provide an update next month after our first monitoring visit.

-ChrisP

Long overdue...

Well, I haven't posted anything in more than a month now. I do have one excuse...I was on vacation for the first three weeks in January. After that I had to catch up on the pile of office work that had built up since I left!

Now I'm back and I should be able to keep things going again.

The capture above is from a mock up of our latest newsletter that I am working on this week. I hope to have it to the printers by the middle of next week, but since I'm so early in the proces it's not clear when it will be ready to go. It may change a little, but you get the gist of it. For those who have seen previous newsletters, you can see that I have changed the look a little. I'm going for more of a magazine style. You'll have to wait and see if I get it right!

Field work has been minimal with the cold weather and ice that have been around in recent weeks. Kim and I did get in Monday to test our new drysuites and I am happy to report that I was warm and toasty and there was not one leak! Love the new Unisuite! Kim had a little leakage around a wrist, but not enough to worry much about.

Our planned NYC plantings have been rescheduled again as we can't seem to line up weather and reporters... I would just as soon plant, but they do want to have this event covered properly in the local press.

I will be travelling to Portland Maine in a couple weeks to present the status of eelgrass in NY waters. Should be an interesting, if not depressing, meeting as managers and scientists from around the northeast report on the status of Zostera in their waters...

Well, I've got to get back to working on the newsletter.

If you're not a subscriber to the newsletter and want a hard copy drop me a line. Just let me finish it first. Those so inclined can also look for the link to a pdf version on our website.

ChrisP

NYC plantings postponed until January…

Some of you may be aware of our efforts to plant eelgrass in Jamaica Bay NYC. It’s a long story, but we are working with NYCDEP and the Gateway Jamaica Bay Unit among others to establish test plantings at three locations near the mouth of the Bay. There was interest in us planting further inside Jamaica, but water quality, temperature and sediment texture appear to be limiting factors here.

After some discussion, we secured permits from both the NYSDEC, Region 2 and Parks to do the plantings earlier this year and we have been looking to schedule plantings for this fall/winter. This pilot planting will hopefully lead the way for a large-scale effort to be funded by NYCDEP…

Although I had hoped to get our plants in by now uncooperative weather and several scheduling conflicts have pushed this work into late January. This late date does not affect the plants as much as it affects the divers. We are fine to plant right through the winter but the water is not very warm as you might imagine.

I will report here when we complete the plantings…

Just be thankful its not you out there diving!

-ChrisP

The Fall season is in full swing…

Although most people assume that our busiest season is summer they couldn’t be further from the truth. We’re out in the boat a lot during the summer given the great weather, but fall is when most of the real important work takes place. Unfortunately, fickle weather patterns including heavy winds from the northwest keep us in the office more than we would like during this time of year. As a result, we have more work to do than days to do it in and we must take advantage of every field day possible. It is not unusual for me to hold off scheduling meetings until I look at the weather forecast for the week.

Although the fall brings us cold air temps the water takes some time to drop. This change is really tied into colder nights that inch the mercury downward day by day. The opposite is true in the spring when the air gets warmer faster than the water. It’s that whole heat capacity thing that I don’t want to get into now…

One big advantage of working in the fall is that the water clarity (vis) really improves. The algae all seem to take a break for the season and do not bloom. This is less than ideal for our filter feeders like shellfish and perfect for those of us who want to see past our noses while diving. This added light is also critical for the grass as we observe a nice little growth spurt in fall as lateral shoots emerge.

During fall we complete our monitoring for the various test planting sites and we summarize the results of our large-scale restoration projects. If the planting has suffered losses over summer we sometimes observe slight increases in shoot density by November or December. It’s not that the shoots get any larger, actually they get smaller, but what we want to see is more of them. For the some projects we may even replant.

Another advantage of the colder temps is that the crabs slow a little and tend to cause less damage to our plots. Unfortunately, most of the damage has already taken place during the summer, but this is helps to protect our new plantings. This is especially true in January, but this frigid water even slows us down!

This year, we don’t have an overly eventful fall. We just have a few projects to complete before January. Planting sites include Caumsett State Park in Long Island Sound (LIS), Great Gull Island (LIS), Jamaica Bay, NYC and several areas along the north fork. I always like to add at least a couple new test plots and we are still figuring out which ones we will use this year.

Soon we will be breaking out our dry suits. For now I can still dive wet…

-ChrisP