This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Community Corner

ReClam the Bay: New Progress On An Important Project

ReClam the Bay is expanding its clam and oyster seeding projects.

The Barnegat Bay has been through the muck as of late. In that muck you will find clams and oysters, the key to helping fix the water quality.

An organization set out a few years ago to repopulate the bay with these shellfish for many different reasons. Some say they did it to save an already dying Barnegat Bay. Yet others say they did it for food purposes. But the truth is ReClam the Bay started introducing infant clams and oysters because the water quality is in big trouble.

“We are an education and outreach organization and we use the growing of shellfish as a teaching element and also as an experimental opportunity,” said Rick Bushnell, president of ReClam the Bay. “We explain to the people around the bay that we are gardeners or farmers in a way. And we are very dependent on the environment.”

Find out what's happening in Toms Riverwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

ReClam the Bay is farming and “planting” young shellfish in Barnegat Bay for the purpose of establishing future generations of clams and oysters. The organization also teaches the public “about the environmental benefit of shellfish filtering, feeding and cleaning our estuary,” according to its website, reclamthebay.org.

“Unlike 50 years ago when some people still had an uncle or a grandfather who was involved with agriculture, today almost no one is involved in agriculture," Bushnell said. "It brings people back to reality of what their parents and grandparents grew up with.”

Find out what's happening in Toms Riverwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Bushnell, who has been the president of the group since 2005, said the group stresses the importance of the water quality, and how it is important to understand the relationship between the water quality, the animals in the water and what makes it way into the bay through rainwater and storm water runoff.

Everything makes it way to bay, as the old saying goes.

Bushnell and a lot of environmental groups push for awareness about the bay, and without one element such as clams and oysters, the entire ecosystem could collapse. For example, without a large population of clams and oysters, the water would be full of bacteria unhealthy for swimmers and fishermen.

Since clams and oysters feed through filtering the water, they clean the water of debris and pollution while pumping clean water back into the bay. As shellfish populations have declined, so has the water quality.

“We continue to learn through teaching about the bay,” said Bushnell.

As the project has grown, ReClam the Bay has added new territory to its shellfish beds. Two of those locations, at the mouth of the Toms River and Mordecai Island, down near Beach Haven, are both expansions of older shellfish beds in Barnegat Bay.

The Toms River site took a lot of planning and preparation, Bushnell said, both in terms of getting permits and preparing the physical site to host young shellfish.

“Three years ago the state went through all the permitting efforts to re-establish an oyster reef at the mouth of the Toms River, and that was really important because that was the first time New Jersey had invested that amount of money for this kind of project in the Barnegat Bay,” Bushnell said. “What we needed for the oyster reef was a hard surface. Oysters, unlike clams, want to sit on a hard surface. So the silt at the mouth of the Toms River needed to be fortified and reinforced. The state dumped a lot of broken clam shells to serve as the bed.”

About half a million clamshells have been deposited at the mouth of the Toms River. Bushnell said the group has been using an experimental technique called “spat on shell” shellfish growing, where a small larval shellfish can grow on an old surf clam shell. This process creates a stable surface for the shellfish to grow.

After the state had reinforced the mouth of the Toms River, ReClam the Bay added the surf clam shells with larval oysters growing on them. The common eastern oyster is what the group has been raising at this location.

The Mordecai Island project has a different focus. The 45-acre coastal marsh island is a prime habitat for breeding and migratory species of indigenous birds and fish, as well as a buffer for Beach Haven on the bay side. The Mordecai Land Trust, an environmental organization that formed to try to protect the island, has been concerned about the loss of land due to wave action (the island sits right near the edge of the Intracoastal Waterway).

Shellfish have been known to help stabilize the ocean floor and ReClam the Bay has been experimenting with shellfish restoration around Mordecai Island, in hopes of fortifying its base. ReClam the Bay is planning to use hard clams, primarily cherrystones and little neck clams, in that area.

The exact locations are undisclosed and are under seasonal harvesting restrictions. The experiment at Mordecai Island with shellfish restoration has two purposes: to establish a stable ocean floor around the island and to monitor how the creatures survive around this location.

Perhaps the most appealing aspect of both projects will be seeing how marine life interacts with the shellfish beds. Fishermen have long endorsed the efforts of ReClam the Bay because of the impact of the clam beds on the fishing populations. As oyster beds and clam beds flourish, the biodiversity around the reef will flourish.

A healthy marine ecosystem starts with shellfish and water quality. If both elements are in poor shape everything that relies on them will suffer.

To learn more about the shellfish restoration project in the bay please visit www.reclamthebay.org. You can learn more about Mordecai Island by visiting www.mordecaimatters.org.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?