Great South Bay Oyster Project

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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.
9-10-13:   The Long Island Clean Water Partnership Launch Covered by the Wall Street Journal

9-10-13: The Long Island Clean Water Partnership Launch Covered by the Wall Street Journal

Long Island environmental groups are banding together to stem the flow of nitrogen into the region’s groundwater and bays.

The initiative announced Tuesday follows what environmentalists are calling the worst year on record for ecological problems related to nitrogen, a nutrient that feeds algal blooms blamed for devastating much of the island’s marine life over the last three decades.

10-7-13 Save The Date: Toxic Tides, Pesticides and Sewage Oh My! A Water Worries Community Forum From The Citizens Campaign For The Environment

Scientists have determined that increasing pollution from sewage, pesticides, and toxic chemicals threatens Long Island’s water. Aging sewer and septic systems leak nitrogen into our underground supply of fresh drinking water, which flows into our creeks, bays, and harbors. This leads to “red tides” and other environmental problems that choke sea life, kill fish, and poison shellfish that people eat.

Fortunately, we can fix it. Citizens Campaign for the Environment, Group for the East End, Long Island Pine Barrens Society, and The Nature Conservancy have been working together for over a year to form the Long Island Clean Water Partnership—a grassroots initiative to restore and protect Long Island’s water resources on a comprehensive level. But action by local, county, and state officials is needed right now if Long Island’s water quality is to be protected and restored for our children and grandchildren. We all have good reason to make sure our water supply is clean and healthy, and we each have a part to play in protecting it for the future.

A BREAK IN THE UNUSUAL MORTALITY EVENT OF BOTTLE NOSE DOLPHINS ON THE EAST COAST

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has determined that the 500 dolphin strandings and more than 330 dolphin deaths from New York to North Carolina this summer are likely due to a strain of morbillivirus which is the same family of viruses that causes measles in humans or canine distemper in dogs.

News12 to Air FIve Part Series on Long Island Water Quality — What’s In The Water (Sept 23rd through 27th)

News12 to Air FIve Part Series on Long Island Water Quality — What’s In The Water (Sept 23rd through 27th)

This series — which runs from Monday the 23rd of September to Friday the 27th with a one hour live special Thursday the 26th 7-8 — is an admirable effort on the part of News12 and its President Pat Dolan, as well as all the scientists within The Long Island Clean Water Partnership and others to bring to light the challenges we face collectively as Long Islanders when it comes to assuring our water quality and our way of life for future generations. The problems are immense, but the solutions are there, if we decide, together on this island we call home, to take action. Our children and grandchild should also fish, swim, clam, and sail as we had, and Long Island should remain a place where people raise their families knowing the water is safe to drink and the environment is a healthy one. News12 understands the urgency, as does the 125+ organizations that make up The Long Island Partnership for Clean Water.

The Long Island Clean Water Partnership Announced / What You Can Do

The Long Island Clean Water Partnership Announced / What You Can Do

As New York continues to recover from Sandy and rebuilds, we are now also faced with a Long Island that is rapidly becoming unlivable due to nitrogenous waste in the ground water, the 117 pesticides in our drinking water, and the pharmaceuticals we throw away or flush down the toilet. The nitrogenous waste is from septic tanks and from lawn fertilizers, from the over 195 small sewage treatment plants scattered across the island, and from antiquated or crippled sewage treatment plants like the one in Bay Park, damaged severely by Sandy.

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