Great Gull Island (LIS) Spring Monitoring

Last week we continued spring monitoring at our large-scale restoration sites in Long Island Sound and the Peconic Estuary.  On one trip across the Sound Steve and I checked on Little Narragansett Bay, CT test plantnigs (to be reported on later) and, on the way back, stopped by Great Gull Island (north), NY.  We had only been to GGI once  or maybe twice last year and things were looking good, but you never know when the site is as exposed as this one is.  This site was planted a couple years ago as part of one of our National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Sound Futures Fund projects.  See photos from two years ago here.

 I was hoping this site had progressed like our plantings on the south side of the island and after seeing everything here, I was not disappointed.  One change this year was a noticeable increase in the number of flowers visible (although not many are seen in the photos I chose to post).  There were a few flowers last year, but the numbers were definitely up this year.  This is a good sign although I don't expect the site to recruit many seedlings any time soon since the energy is so high here that seeds will be either buried too deeply or exported offsite until the patch size increases significantly.

 As far a follow up monitoring, we shouldn't  really have to go back here much this year to check on things, but we may schedule a mid to late summer visit to make sure everything is OK.  I have not decided whether to add more plants here, but it is definitely not on the top of my list at the moment given the other plantings we need to do.  Now it is just a matter of having a little patience and waiting for the grass to expand over time as it spreads vegetatively across the bottom.  The older plantings on the south side of the island clearly show that it is just a matter of creating stable patches to initiate a successful restoration project when the proper site is selected.

That's all for this site for now as I need to report on the other sites we've visited so far this year.


ChrisP

It’s been a long winter!

It’s been a very long winter and we are all ready to begin field work. We have spent the winter renovating offices, constructing a new seagrass lab and re-organizing and cleaning out the greenhouse. Now it’s time to get back in the water.

Last Friday marks the first dive of the season for the crew as Kim and Barry went out to check on one of our test planting sites at 67 Steps in Southold, Long Island Sound. The day was unseasonably warm; a perfect day for the first dive of the season. Fortunately, the plants looked great there. Some early season camera issues didn’t allow for pictures of all of the patches, but Kim reported that everything she saw looked really good.

I hope these observations are a sign of things to come as we launch our spring monitoring visits to all of our sites. After a winter like the one we just had, I have concerns over whether or not everything survived; only time will tell whether we had any losses.

For the next week we have to limit our observations to shore dives until the boats are back in the water in early April. Once our boats are back in, we can check on our sites out at Plum and Great Gull Island as well as scout out new spring test planting sites.

Finally, we also need to get into Shinnecock Bay and check on the status of a large-scale seeding effort and experiment that we began last summer. The results of this project could be very exciting…

Check back for more observations in the coming weeks.

-ChrisP

Rock Planting 101…

Rock planting is a simple and effective way of establishing eelgrass in high energy rocky environments. It all starts with selecting the perfect site…Once you have that, you’re half way there! Obviously, it is not always easy to find these sites and that is the real challenge. I couldn’t possibly cover all that goes into the site selection process in a blog post, so I won’t even try. We’ll just assume for now that you have such a site.

The following photos are from our field work yesterday off of Great Gull Island where we have initiated a large-scale planting effort based on the success of our test plantings. These are the steps we take following collection of the donor plants from a suitable location. Again, this will not be covered in this post.

Step1. Chose your weapon! I prefer that old fashioned crow bar (above) while others on the crew use l

arge screwdrivers or short sections of rebar.

Step 2. Flip the rocks in preparation for planting.

Step 3. Place the plants in groups of 6 to 12.

Step 3a. Plant in groups…to speed coalescence. 1 meter OC spacing is ideal if there are enough rocks.

Step 4. Monitor. The plantings should look like this after a couple months. Notice how the shoots are growing away from the rock they were planted under. (same site, but from a previous planting).

Step 4a. Monitor more!…Eventually the rocks disappear as they get buried under sand and gravel that accumulates as the eelgrass shoot density increases. The plantings should like this after about three years! (different site same method).

-ChrisP