The Nature Conservancy Receives $25,000 from National Grid

Funds Support Shellfish Restoration, Water Quality Enhancements -- Important Conservation Measures as Bay is Great South Bay is Plagued with Brown Tide

Cold Spring Harbor, NY — July 2008 — The Nature Conservancy announced today that it has been awarded a $25,000 grant (as part of a three year $75,000 commitment) for shellfish restoration efforts from the National Grid Foundation. The grant will assist The Nature Conservancy in its efforts to restore shellfish and water quality in Long Island’s Great South Bay.

“This generous contribution and the on-going support from the National Grid Foundation will help expand the Conservancy’s innovative shellfish restoration efforts in Great South Bay, where we have restocked the water with over three million clams,” said Nancy Kelley, executive director of The Nature Conservancy on Long Island. “At a critical time like this – when Brown Tide is plaguing the Bay – continued support from such funders like the National Grid Foundation can help keep our marine habitats viable. We are thankful for their support.”

Specifically, the funds will help underwrite the costs of an education and hard clam nursery project with Western Suffolk Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) working with local high school students. The program aims to increase students’ appreciation and understanding of the importance of shellfish and to help restock Long Island coastal waters with hard-shelled clams.

Raising hatchery-reared hard clams to a size that is large enough to protect them from most predators and then stocking them in harvest-free areas has been identified as an important component of The Nature Conservancy’s large-scale efforts to restore self-sustaining natural populations of hard clams in the Great South Bay.

In this program, 20-25 tenth, eleventh, and twelfth grade students will have the opportunity to construct a clam nursery raft (7ft x 12ft) to grow seed clams under controlled conditions while being exposed to a new and exciting field. Through field trip excursions and classroom lectures, students will develop an understanding of marine ecology, the anatomy and physiology of hard-shelled clams, scientific procedures used in mariculture research, data collection and evaluation, and the socio-political issues involved in the shellfish industry. The project culminates with students releasing approximately 100,000 immature clams onto the bay bottom.

During the 1970s, there were enough hard clams to filter 40 percent of the Great South Bay every day. Today, only one percent of the Great South Bay is filtered daily. Restored and properly managed shellfish populations can renew once-thriving fisheries and recreational opportunities that are part of Long Island’s rich maritime heritage.

Since 2004, The Nature Conservancy has been involved in restocking its 13,400-acre underwater holdings in the Great South Bay with hard clams in the hopes that they will reproduce, and ultimately restore this depleted water body to its former glory. To date, nearly three million adult clams have been put back in the Bay. Suffolk County is an underwriter of this initiative.

The Nature Conservancy is a leading conservation organization working around the world to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people. The Conservancy and its more than 1 million members have protected nearly 120 million acres worldwide. On Long Island, The Nature Conservancy has helped to preserve more than 100,000 acres. Visit us on the web at nature.org/longisland.