Great South Bay Oyster Project

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Recent Progress

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Habitat Restoration

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Habitat Restoration

Oysters eat murky water for lunch. If we bring them back in volume, they’ll clean the bay better and faster than any human can.

We advocate for healing the creeks that feed our bay, for bay-friendly yards, for helping to return a shellfishing industry to the Great South Bay, and for the deployment of modern wastewater treatment technologies to address the problems caused by 500,000 cesspools and septic tanks, as well as the 197 large scale septic systems in malls, apartment complexes and locally.

Volunteer 

Lend a hand! Join our Oyster Project Team and help revive The Great South Bay.

Partnering With Oyster Growers

Save The Great South Bay works closely with oyster growers on The South Shore. We seek to implement new techniques for the reintroduction of oysters such as we see being undertaken in The Chesapeake, or through New York City’s Billion Oyster Project, or closer to home, with Friends of Bellport Bay. Given the value of oysters today, there is also a lot of innovation around how best to grow them.

Of course, nothing happens without cleaner water. That is why getting rid of our cesspools and septic tanks, healing our creeks, tackling runoff, and practicing natural lawn care is so important.

Please contact us with any suggestions you may have. You can also donate our efforts. We want to apply the latest techniques in aquaculture to revitalize our bay, our economy and our local culture.

We advocate for healing the creeks that feed our bay, for bay-friendly yards, for helping to return a shell fishing industry to the Great South Bay, and for the deployment of modern wastewater treatment technologies to address the problems caused by 500,000 cesspools and septic tanks, as well as the 197 large scale septic systems in malls, apartment complexes and locally.

Where You Can Get Fresh, Long Island Blue Point Oysters

The Making Of An Oyster Sanctuary

Part One Of Three
Site Evaluation
Part Two Of Three
Establishing the Sanctuary
Part Three Of Three
Enhancing and Measuring for Success
Recent planting in the Great South Bay Oyster Sanctuary 07/2023

Recent Progress On Habitat Restoration

Here’s what we’ve recently been up to. Your participation could look like one of these updates, or – if you can’t dive in there and get dirty yourself, just support the project and we’ll find a way to do it. Everyone has a part in this shared cause.
Shots Of Sandy Ravaging The Bellport Marina

Shots Of Sandy Ravaging The Bellport Marina

The intrepid Michael Busch of Great South Bay Images (Facebook: GSB Images) unearthed these dramatic shots of Sandy as it hit Bellport Bay and the marina. The sheer force of the storm can be seen in every shot. Visit his site/FB page for higher res pics and prints....

“Long Island is All Clammed Up” – Is It Too Late For Our Bays?

“Long Island is All Clammed Up” – Is It Too Late For Our Bays?

It is important to remember that many of the land use issues discussed each week have real impacts to the lives of Long Islanders, and failure to heed economic and environmental warning signs can lead to real consequences. If we fail to protect our water system, the consequences will be dire.

In recent weeks, environmentalists, New York State government leaders, News 12 Long Island and others have been working on a public campaign to increase public awareness about Long Island’s drinking and surface waters. Failing to protect the aquifer is costly on a variety of fronts. With the recent call for state intervention, and the return of brown tide on the South Shore, it’s critical that action is taken sooner rather than later.

Long Island’s Ground Water Pollution Problem — How Nitrogenous Waste From Septic Tanks, Fertilizers, and Poorly Treated Water Is Sparking Potent Algae Blooms in Our Bays And Choking Off Life

Long Island’s Ground Water Pollution Problem — How Nitrogenous Waste From Septic Tanks, Fertilizers, and Poorly Treated Water Is Sparking Potent Algae Blooms in Our Bays And Choking Off Life

A global expert on algal blooms and nitrogenous waste, Prof. Gobler has been tireless in getting his message out to all Long Islanders and to the country — we have a very serious problem with polluted ground water, and it is triggering algal blooms — brown tide, rust tide, red tide, blue-green algae — and wiping out marine and fresh water habitats. As a part of The Long Island Clean Water Partnership (please sign up and help out!), a group of some 125+ organizations seeking to build a sustainable Long Island, SCERP (The Stony Brook Coastal and Estuarine Research Project) is contributing some of the basic scientific research that is helping us to identify our water problems and to develop the solutions.

From SCERP: DAMAGING BROWN TIDE RE-EMERGES ACROSS ENTIRE SOUTH SHORE OF LONG ISLAND — Tell Our Politicians via Facebook!

From SCERP: DAMAGING BROWN TIDE RE-EMERGES ACROSS ENTIRE SOUTH SHORE OF LONG ISLAND — Tell Our Politicians via Facebook!

This is so discouraging. The brown tide has come back with a vengeance. It is widespread (except at the inlets, the New Inlet included), and the longer it lasts, the more damage it will do to habitats and to shell fish and fin fish. This new algal bloom just underlines the fact that if we don’t start to address immediately how our septic tanks, antiquated sewer systems, and lawn and agricultural fertilizer are fueling these algal blooms by loading the groundwater with nitrogen, our bay, and all our bays will die.

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