Shellfish in the Eelgrass

Bay Scallop in a natural eelgrass meadow off Shelter Island, NY

 Yesterday we had hoped to get out to several of our Long Island Sound test planting locations to check on their status, but unfortunately the heavy fog prevented us from getting that far.  Lucky for us, the fog wasn't really  hanging around the Peconic Estuary as much so we decided to cut our losses and drop in on a few sites that I had been meaning to dive for a while.  These sites included two recently discovered natural meadows that we located using aerial photos this past winter as well as two potential test planting sites.  While the test planting sites didn't look promising, the natural meadows were beautiful and, as usual, we observed some pretty interesting things. 

Four large hard clams growing within a same natural eelgrass meadow off Shelter Island, NY

One observation had to do with crab damage/bioturbation of isolated shoots, but I won't get into that in this post.  The other observation related to the large number of shellfish found in these meadows.  The first photo shows one of the dozens of scallops observed.  This photo was taken near the deepwater edge of the grass where it was more patchy and the scallops really stood out.  I did see losts of smaller bugs, but these were within the dense grass and much harder to find and phtotograph.  The photo immediately above shows some of the  hard clams also observed in the same meadow.  I don't think I have ever seen so many in one location and I know that I have never seen four clustered together like that.

Two hard clams growing within 8" of the group of four shown above

In addition to those four, I found a group of two only 8" away from the first group. The only other location where we have seen a similar density of hard clams was in the meadow on the east side of the ferry terminal at North Haven.  The grass there has since been lost and the clams are gone now but it was another clam hot spot. It just goes to show that as we lose or eelgrass we also lose the fisheries associated with it.  Let's hope this meadow off Shelter Island persists; at this point it looks great.


ChrisP

Time to catch up on old posts...

Unfortunately, I've been a little too busy with field work to take the time and post to the blog this summer. Time flies when you are busy. Over the coming weeks, when weather keeps us in the office and as time allows, I want to provide updates on various projects we have underway. We have had some exciting results this year and we look forward to the fall planting season.

Restoration is underway at several sites in Long Island sound, Peconic Estuary and in the South Shore Estuary Reserve. Plantings range in size from small-scale test plots to large scale multiple acre sites.

Monitoring is underway in all estuaries especially in the PE with increased attention focusing on light and temperature measurements in existing eelgrass, historic eelgrass and potential restoration sites. Another large project is underway in cooperation with Fred Short at UNH involving collection of plant samples for genetic analysis. Expect more specific updates soon...

-ChrisP

Spring Fauna

Now that summer is here, I thought it would make an opportune time to mention our more interesting animal encounters from this spring. It seems like every year, we start our spring dive season earlier and earlier, and this year the weather was exceptionally warm and beautiful for the most part. We began monitoring last year’s plantings by mid-March, but I have to say didn’t see too many fish while diving…the water was still too cold at this point I am guessing. By the first week of April, pipefish, gobies, and even a yellowtail flounder were seen in Little Peconic Bay when looking for seahorses near Chris’ father’s oyster cages.

When attempting to visit our planting site on the south side of Great Gull Island in mid-April, over 30 seals surrounded our boat. One even breached right next to the boat; we took that as a warning to stay out of the water. We have been told that these seals, including harbor and gray, can get aggressive this time of year because it’s mating season. It was the same scenario on the south side of Plum Island on the same day and then again at both sites one week later. Once again, we couldn’t get in at Gull Island as the seals were way too numerous and getting a little too close for comfort, but Chris decided to get in at Plum Island because the seals kept their distance here. They just hung out in deeper water until we left so they could go back to their favorite rocks and “haul out”.

By mid-May, we started to see our usual fluke and flounder at our restoration and donor sites as well as juvenile cunner and blackfish. Other noteworthy sightings were a school of squid hovering over an eelgrass bed in Gardener’s Bay in late-May and a massive school of young cod hanging out in our restored eelgrass South of Great Gull on June 15 (the seals finally left). Also, Barry took a few funny shots of an oyster toadfish trying to fit into a scallop shell in Hallock Bay which I find hysterical. We have yet to see seahorses in the wild this year, but will keep you updated. I can’t wait to see what summer brings!

For more photos, please visit us on Facebook!

Kimberly Petersen Manzo

Spring Monitoring Continues...

Yesterday, three of us were able to get in the water and check out the status of our eelgrass restoration sites around Plum Island and Great Gull Islands.

First stop was Great Gull Island (north side) where we had planted as part of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) grant for eelgrass work in eastern Long Island Sound. I am happy to report that the plants looked great, small, but great (photos above). It is always a little shocking to see the plants for the first time in the spring when they still have the diminutive winter growth habit. The last time we observed these plants was in the fall when they were still quite long and waving in the current. Also, during this time of year there is so much macroalgae that it tends to hide the shoots. The prognosis is VERY good for this site and we plan to begin additional plantings soon.

Second stop was the south side of Great Gull where we wanted to check on a restoration site first planted 4 years ago. This site is amazing and the patches have really spread over the last couple years. Despite the great vis and perfect conditions, we were not able to get in the water here. Once on station, we were greeted by approximately 30 seals. Most were pups, but there were enough agitated adults around to keep us on the boat. We are all too familiar with their breaching and nostril snorting to know that we were not welcome here. We’ll have to wait a little longer to dive here, but I am sure that this site is thriving given it’s performance in the past.

The third stop was Plum Island South (Fort Terry) to look for remains of a test planting we had conducted last fall to see if this site could support grass. Unfortunately, after much searching (storms had removed our buoys) we only found a couple shoots. The wave energy and sand movement are apparently too much for our small patches of plants as those that remained were buried under several inches of sand. This very frustrating given that water quality and light are more than adequate at this site. I am optimistic that we can do some additional work here this summer to measure light levels to see how deep grass might survive here. I’m not holding my breath, but I would like to think that this site could work for us.

On a more positive note, our last dive was on the Plum Island North (Radiator Beach) which was another planting associated with the NFWF project. The crew had visited this site a couple weeks ago so I already knew it was doing well, but I wanted to see it for myself. Plants looked great here in 18-22’ of water (above). The area where we planted a large number of patches 1m OC looked great and we are on schedule to begin spring plantings soon to greatly enlarge this area. One interesting observation was the fact that the deepest plots (20-22’) were showing signs of erosion from high currents (below). This area is too deep to be affected by waves, but it appears that this far off shore the plants are outside of the shadow of the nearby point and rock piles that otherwise slow the currents. I don’t believe the currents are limiting; this is just something we need to take into consideration when planning out the planting.

Next field day is planned for Friday…

-ChrisP

Thanks Hurricane Billy!

Yes...I am being facetious!

Although we're already a couple named storms past Billy (Danny most recently), we hadn't had a chance to check on a number of our test plots that were in his path. Today was our day to catch up. We wanted to determine what if any impact the hurricane had and decide on which of our plantings we will scale-up this fall.

So the good news is...most everything was in pretty good shape. The bad news was that it took us much longer than it should have to check on the plots since the heavy surf had moved all of our marker buoys off Plum Island more than 100 feet from their original location making it hard to find our plantings. Also, once they were found, we had to drag the buoys and cement blocks back to their original locations. We also lost a temperature logger that was attached to a cement block at one site. I think we may eventually be able to find this if we follow the trajectory the buoys and blocks took. It is amazing to think that the storm was able to move full sized cement blocks in 10-12ft of water! Fortunately, most of the plants remained in the bottom.

Although we didn't visit the site today, we did have one fatality from Billy that we noted last week. Test plots along the east side of Cartwright Shoal (not shown here) off the south shore of Gardiners Island were totally obliterated in the storm. I had high hopes for this site, but the storm changed all of that and I don't see us going back. We planting on the SE side of the shoal hoping to avoid the prevailing NW in the winter, but I hadn't planned on a storm from the NE that destroyed everything. Oh well, that's why to do test plantings before investing the time and money into large-scale plantings.

The best news today was that both Plum Island planting sites (top and left) weathered the storm. We did have some loss and damage, but all and all, the plantings made it through and we are on our way to large-scale plantings this fall. Not surprisingly, the deeper ~12ft plants looked the best, but we even had survival at the 8ft depth of the shallow station. We had assumed that the shallow plants would have been smothered or eroded. It turned out they were buried in sand, but not enough to completely cover them.

In the Sound we did see some damage at our Duck Pond Point site in Peconic, but the Horton's Point, 67 steps and Rocky Point sites all showed no sign of storm damage and look like good candidates for full-scale plantings. We will not be planting any more this fall at Duck Pond Point, but the other sites will definitely get more attention. Horton's Point (above right) and 67 steps, in particular, look to be very good candidates for full scale plantings. If Duck Pond Point makes it through the winter, it too may become a large-scale planting site.

Let the plantings begin...

-ChrisP

Too much of a good thing?

On days like today there is no excuse for not getting out in the field. Although we were down two staff, it was still possible for Kim and I to get out and do what we needed to do. It was either that or stay in the office and catch up on paperwork (me) and webpage updates (Kim).

With a skeleton crew there was only so much that we can do efficiently so I decided we would focus on scouting for new planting sites around Plum Island that we have been trying to complete for the last few weeks and monitoring some older test planting sites in the area.

After a quick call to the homeland security folks on Plum Island we were on our way to visit the cool, deep and high velocity waters of eastern LIS. I won't go into any detail here, but suffice it to say that our scouting was a success and we did find at least one promising looking site on the north side of the Plum Island. This matches up with some earlier observations from April or May. I would have to look back and check the date, but it doesn't matter at this point. We may be planting this site as soon as tomorrow, weather and staff permitting.

The other, and frankly more interesting part of our day, was to monitor some test plantings from this summer. If things make it through August, we can usually be assured that water quality and temperature are not limiting. It's too early to determine if disturbance will be limiting, as this kicks in in the fall and winter, but if the plants don't make it through the summer, there is nothing to monitor and no potential for success, so we have to start somewhere.

Our sites today included two sites on the south side of Plum Island and one on the north side of Great Gull Island. The first two are part of our Suffolk County Eelgrass Restoration Initiative and the third is part of our National Fish and Wildlife Foundation Long Island Sound restoration project. As always, we couldn't do any of this work without the generous support of our funding partners!

First, I have to say that the plants looked great at both sites and it looks like we have some very promising large-scale planting candidates for the coming fall, but we did make one interesting observation. There we incredible numbers of Lacuna vincta snails on many of the plants. I'm not talking about normal numbers, but what appeared to be overwhelming numbers. We like these snails and actually will move them to a completely unvegetated site (one that has no algae to act as an alternative host for these grazers) to help clean off the epiphytes and biofilm on transplants (we're just about to do this for some plantings near Duck Pond Point in LIS), but these were almost at an alarming density.

I don't think this is a bad thing at all, but these little guys were definitely causing some grazing damage to the leaves and sheaths of many of the plants. I do remember seeing a fairly high density on some plants early on at our St. Thomas Pt. restoration site where we have had considerable success so maybe this is just the way it always is during this time of year and I just missed it..or maybe the crazy weather this year has spawned a bumper crop of snails...who knows? I will have to look back at the photos to see what time of year this occurred, however. (Editors Note: I did take a look back at shots from a couple other restoration sites over the years and, in fact, August showed the peak density for Lacuna snails. Some plants appeared to have densities rivaling those seen in the pictures here, but it still seems that we're a little higher this year than in previous years. Also, there was very little, if any, indication of heavy herbivory damage in these earlier photos from other LIS planting sites.)

It is also possible that when the eelgrass is at a low density and there are a large number of snails on the nearby macroalgae, the snails may prefer the eelgrass and leave the algae to preferentially feed on the eelgrass epiphytes and, yes, the leaf tissue! Since there are so few eelgrass plants, the snail density reaches what appears to be a saturation point on many of the plants.

If this is the case what is causing it? I just don't know right now. However, I still believe that the presence of snails, even at these very high densities, are better than no snails. At the Duck Pond Point site in LIS, there is no macroalgae and therefore no snails except for a couple that came along for the ride when we transplanted. Here the plants look fairly good, but there is a heavy layer of epiphytes that must be decreasing overall productivity. Once we deliver some snails to these plants, the problem should be solved.

With each season we learn more about the natural cycles underway in the waters around us. Not every year is the same, but trends have emerged. I hope that with this knowledge we can improve our ability to successfully plant eelgrass. So far, so good, but everyday in the field teaches us something new.

-ChrisP

So much field work...so little time!

After what was a pretty slow May marred by weather related delays, we hit the water hard in mid June and basically haven't stopped since. Sure there's been the necessary office work, but the pace has been nearly frantic throughout the summer.

We have been busy planting out new test plots in LIS, PE and the SSER in preparation for the coming restoration season. Our monitoring work has followed the progress of these new plantings every other week and we have also made time to go out and check on our plantings from previous years to see how they are faring.

This summer we are also testing out one TWO new planting methods, one in Shinnecock Bay and PE and the other in LIS and PE. Both could open up new restoration opportunities for us in these areas and may help to reduce restoration costs and labor.

Our monitoring results have been VERY encouraging and generally fall into what we have come to expect for the region. LIS sites, both old and new have met or exceeded our expectations. The same can be said for Shinnecock bay plantings. PE, on the the other hand, continues to disappoint, at least in some areas. A new site off Plum Island, however, may be the one we've been waiting for. If this site proves successful, it could be on a scale unheard of in the PE. So far so good!

Look for detailed posts on each of these projects as time permits in the coming weeks.

For now we have to take advantage of the very cooperative weather and continue with field work!

-ChrisP

Hallocks Bay seedlings thrive...so far!

Today Kim and I took the small Parker out to Hallock Bay to check on the status of our seedlings there. Last year we planted approximately 500,000 seeds in two areas; one in inner north Gidds Bay and one east of the inner channel running north/south in Hallocks. Kim, Steve and Ali had been out to check on the seedlings on April 27th, but we like to check on things monthly, if not more often. At that time they located the densest patches and took pictures and did some quadrat counts to get a general idea of densities before laterals start forming in May.

Today the weather was nearly perfect for observations with clear skies and a light breeze out of the northwest that add only a slight chop to the protected waters of Hallocks. Once in the water, Kim was able to locate the seedlings at the channel site in Hallocks and take a number of good photographs (left and below). Plants here were still small for this time of year given that water temps have been slow to rise this spring. However they all looked even healthier than in April according to Kim who had observed them both times. The densest areas looked especially impressive, even if the plants were only a few inches tall.

Observations in Gidds Bay were similar although the plants (large photo above) were larger given the finer sediment and additional nutrients available . These muddy sites seem to recruit and grow seedlings very well early in the season, but are typically the first areas to lose grass in summer at the water clarity declines, temperatures increase and crab activity rises. This is what we observed in Noyack Creek last summer when we lost all of our seedlings in June. I think conditions in Hallocks are better than in Noyack and we can only hope that this does not happen again.

Now that we have successful seedling establishment, all we can do is sit back and wait for the coming summer. Only time will tell if this planting will be successful. In the coming weeks I hope to work with the Southold Town Trustees to establish a temporary habitat sanctuary at, the channel site minimally so that, if the plants make it through July and into August, we can scale-up the effort and plan for a large-scale Buoy Deployed Seeding (BuDS) here. The fact that we have seeds maturing into August around Fishers Island gives us until that late in the season plant, but we must act quickly if we are to establish the sanctuary...

I hope to report back on the success of these sites.

-ChrisP

The Ponies are Growing!

I’ve been out for a couple weeks now, but just before I left we had another batch of baby seahorses arrive. We’ve been through a few of these events and unfortunately, we have not been able to get these little guys past about 10-14 days. This time is different.

The big difference was the fact that Kim Petersen took the babies home at the end of week one and was able to keep them fed. Past broods have suffered major losses after the first weekend as I was only able to feed them a few times. Also, I was putting too much food in the tank at one time. This time Kim fed them several times each day and got them past what has been a major bottleneck.

I came back to the office today to find about 50 healthy looking, large ponies swimming in a 10 gallon tank. All are jet black except for one “blonde”. Since I didn’t observe this batch closely from the beginning, I don’t know how many were light from the start, but I have seen maybe 10% of the lighter colored individuals in past batches.

There is no guarantee that we will be able to raise these guys to adulthood, but from the looks of it we are on the right track. The fact that they have more than doubled in size and are eating well is a good sign.

For now, I will cross my fingers and hope that we have figured this out.

-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

“Donut” anyone?

On a recent dive at the Terry’s Point restoration site, I was surprised to observe very small “bald spots” at the center of the larger patches indicating that we may be observing the initiation of what I call “donuts”. In this case, there is still a dense covering of rhizomes, but there are few if any shoots in this open area leading me to believe that some process may be limiting shoot recruitment here.

At many natural meadows in high energy areas we observe distinct patterns including rings, crescents or C-shaped formations scattered throughout the bed. In fact, this distinctive signature helps us to distinguish grass from macroalgae beds in aerial photos in the Sound and Gardiners Bay. Despite the fact that these forms are common, it is not really clear how and when they form.

I always assumed that these started off as circular patches that eventually lose their centers. In some cases there may be a breach of the ring leading to the formation of a “C” or similar. However, since we have not observed this, I just don’t know if this is the process.

Continued observations at Terry’s may allow us to follow this progression. Overall, the grass here is flourishing and the early summer plantings that Steve, Kim and Ali did this year, adjacent to the large patches are doing REALLY well, so there is no reason to think that the grass is under stress here. In fact, I couldn’t be happier with the project.

Only time will tell whether this is beginning of a natural meadow-shaping process. All we can do is sit back and let nature take its course. In the mean time we will continue to plant shoots in the adjacent rocky areas to ensure that this meadow expands and flourishes. I wish all of our sites were doing so well!

-ChrisP

Little Ram Test Plantings continued…

This week after getting back from giving a talk at the Restore America’s Estuaries Conference in Providence Rhode Island we were able to get a little field work in.

On the top of the agenda was checking on the status of the Little Ram Island plantings off of Shelter Island. In my previous post I reported on the survival of these rock plantings into September, but I was not in the water that day and wanted to see them first hand. I also wanted to add some fall plantings to provide a better overwinter test as late spring/early summer plantings are not the norm for us.

When we arrived at the buoy and anchored we were welcomed by a curious seal that watched as we donned our gear. I was hoping to see our friend in the water, but despite how many times we have seen seals on the surface in the fall and winter, we have never seen one up close in the water. Its probably better off as we are not supposed to “harass” marine mammals regardless of how innocuous it may seem.

Once in the water, it was clear that the buoy had been moved as nothing looked right and no plants could be found. I eventually swam about 100ft. north and was able to find our plots. Once I moved the blocks and buoy over, Kim and I were able to add some additional plantings and check on the status of those from spring. Ali was on the boat for support.

I must say that I was not overly impressed with what was there (See above photo). It looked like we might have lost a few since September, which would be odd as we usually lose things in July and August, but again I wasn’t in the water last time so I’m not a good judge of what was there.

What is clear is that we added a few hundred more plants to the area to give it a better chance of overwintering and spreading. One thing we will have to watch out for is the growth of the Sargassum. There was absolutely no sign of this species in the spring and now it carpets the rocks we planted under. Surrounding rocks actually have a heavy growth of much taller Sargassum. I don’t think it will be a problem if the eelgrass can keep up, but we will have to watch. Never a dull moment…

I am scheduled to meet with the folks form Shelter Island to discuss future plans for this site, Cornelius Point and Coecles Harbor the first week in November. I am hoping that they will look favorably on our efforts on the Island and allow us to continue.

-ChrisP

A look at Lake Montauk eelgrass

It’s been a very long time since I’ve been diving in Lake Montauk to look at eelgrass. I think it was actually 14 years ago! Well, all I can say is a lot has changed…and not for the better.

CCE has been contracted to work with the Town of East Hampton Natural Resources Department to help develop a “Watershed Protection Plan”. As part of this effort my group signed up to help with monitoring, mapping and trends analysis of eelgrass in the Lake along with some sediment analysis.

A quick look at recent aerials told me that much of the grass that I had seen in the past was no longer there, but we needed to get in and establish permanent sampling stations, count shoots, estimate percent algae coverage, take photographs and collect sediment samples.

Since this is a joint effort, on our way through town, we met up with Mark Abramson from the EHNRD and headed out for a day in windy Montauk. We brought along our Southern Skimmer and all of our diver gear and sampling equipment.

After launching the boat at the town ramp off West Shore Drive we headed over to the large flat just south of Star Island and east of the main channel. This has always been a hot spot for eelgrass and as we observed, seems to be one of the last hold outs in the Lake. While we worked here we were approached by two different baymen who were clamming in an area nearby that interestingly enough used to support grass. For some reason they thought we were poaching bay scallops. Once they learned who we were and what we were up to, they left us alone.

After a little poking around it was obvious why there concern was warranted. Kim and Steve both reported seeing lots of scallops in the grass. Most, if not all were legal, but many were on the smaller size. The baymen had told us that the area had been seeded with scallops and as the photo above shows that apparently it worked.

The grass in on the flat looked relatively healthy with a lots of epiphytic growth on the older leaves. It was also good to see our old friend Lacuna snails cleaning off the epiphytes. Quadrat counts indicated densities across our 4 stations ranging from 0-310shoots/m2. A little on the low side, but not to the point where we think the meadow is going to disappear next year.

After finishing up on the flat we headed up to another meadow on the east side of the channel opposite the Coast Guard station and the commercial fishing dock. Here the grass was a little thicker and possibly healthier based on proximity to the inlet. Shoot counts here across 5 stations ranged from 0-420shoots/m2.

We still have more to do, but it was nice to finally get back out to Lake Montauk. Next week we should be finishing up our field work and getting on to the analysis of aerial photos to determine the trends analysis. I’m guessing the lake lost at least 75% of its grass since the 90’s!

-ChrisP

Another batch of Ponies has arrived…early!

A full week ahead of when we expected, the babies have arrived. We were prepared for delivery the end of this week, but our male seems to think that 14 days is a more suitable gestation period than the “typical” 21 days.

If you look in the top righthand corner of this photo you can see a “Sharpie” mark on the side of the tank that provides a scale. If you look even closer around the seahorse you can see the tiny brine shrimp that the ponies are feeding on.

As with the last batch, it is interesting to note that there seems to be range of colors in the seahorses. I don't know if these are just random individuals changing color based on "mood", as the adults do, or if some are just lighter or darker.

Given the early arrival we didn’t have food ready right away, but 24hrs later (this AM), we have all the baby brine shrimp the ponies could ever want. Mike Patricio (the shellfish hatchery manager) has been nice enough to not only hatch the brine shrimp, but also provide algae to feed the shrimp so that, hopefully, we can make them that much more nutritious to the ponies.

We’ve come to realize pretty quickly that there is a VERY steep learning curve when it comes to getting the seahorses beyond the first couple weeks and we hope that this time we will be more successful.

All we can do is sit back and watch them eat and hope that what we provide is enough. We are also looking into raising copepods and gathering wild plankton to feed, but we weren’t too successful in pulling our plankton net last time out. I don’t know that there is much in the water this time of year.

The male is busy chasing around the female so I have not doubt that we will have another batch of babies in 2-3 weeks from now.

-ChrisP

Little Ram Test Plantings Survive!

Every year we add a few new test planting sites to our ongoing effort to bring eelgrass back to the Peconic Estuary (See our Google Map for sites). In many cases these sites fail, but we never cease in our effort to find new sites to work in. We believe that conditions are suitable in many parts of the PE, we just need to find the right sites.

Among the sites this year was a late-comer to the process, Little Ram Island, Shelter Island. This site really was an afterthought as we didn’t stumble upon it until this spring and normally this would put it in the cue for next year’s sites with a fall ’08 planting. However, in this case I thought it would be worth it to try a late spring planting given that it was in cooler Gardiners Bay. My experience in the PE in the early 90’s indicated that early summer plantings don’t make it, but I was hoping this site was different.

The first thing that attracted me to the Little Ram site is a characteristic that all of our successful sites have in common; this site has rocks, lots of them. Visible rocks on the surface usually indicate rocks below and they also guarantee that there will be little if any boating or shellfishing to disturb the site. In fact, rocks appear to be the only refuge for some of the last areas of grass in the PE where physical and anthropogenic disturbance can be considerable.

During a recon trip form Cornelius Pt. to the large meadow at Ram Island this past May we literally almost ran into this site. I thought it looked promising so we dropped in to find it was packed with perfectly sized planting rocks and a nice sandy bottom. Perfect for rock planting! During this same visit Kim also found our first seahorse in the PE, but that’s another story.

At the end of May/beginning of June Steve, Kim and I planted several hundred shoots under existing softball-sized rocks at the site the same way we plant in LIS. However rather than spread the plants widely as we have in the past, we concentrated on filling in select areas to see If this would work better.

Follow up visits in July indicated good growth, but a disturbing amount of red drift macroalgae moving through the site that could block out the light and smother the plants. The prevailing current here is south to north and the currents run along Ram Island, pick up algae and other debris and transport it past Little Ram and up to Cornelius Pt.

A dive by Steve, Kim and Ali last week indicates that the site looks very different from early summer. Sargassum is now growing from the surface of all of the rocks carpeting the bottom in the planting area. Fortunately, the grass extends above this layer and appears to be doing well. A close look at the rhizomes indicates that branching is occurring as the plants grow out from under the rocks and spread across the bottom.

One major thing we have changed this year about or transplanting technique that makes success more likely is that we have stopped holding harvested plant material in our greenhouse and have moved to a system where we collect and plant on the same day. I believe that this has resulted in much more vigorous and healthy planting stock. In past years we have held plants, sometimes for weeks, in our greenhouse with varied success.

Since we are past he most stressful part of the year I expect the existing plants to continue to thrive and thicken through the fall, winter and into next spring. I will soon contact with the Town of Shelter Island to apprise them of our early success and seek their cooperation in expanding this area. Assuming they agree, we will more than likely add additional plantings this fall to see how things fair over the winter. Assuming the success of these, we may also add more plants next spring to enlarge the area.

-ChrisP