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Barnegat Bay at the mouth of the Gunning River. Photo courtesy of Bob Birdsall.
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Share Your Concerns About the Barnegat Bay With Us
The Barnegat Bay Partnership (BBP) needs your help! We know you have concerns about the bay and great ideas about how to protect it - and we'd like to hear them.
The Barnegat Bay is an ecological treasure and supports one of the most valuable economies (over $4 billion each year) of any estuary in the nation. We are now revising our long-term plan (known as the "Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan for Barnegat Bay" or "CCMP") for protecting and restoring this precious bay.
The CCMP is a community-developed road map for improving the bay's water quality and enhancing its natural resources. Approved by the U.S. EPA in 2002, the current plan has served us well. However, it does not address the impacts of climate change and sea-level rise on the bay and its watershed. Additionally, our scientific knowledge about the bay and its natural resources has increased tremendously since 2002. It's time to review the progress we have made, reassess our priorities, and refocus our collective efforts for the bay.
We want to hear your thoughts and concerns about the bay and your ideas for the future management, protection, and enhancement of its valuable resources.
Please take just a few minutes to answer eight questions on this Feedback Form.
Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback - it's important to us as we plan for the future.
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Captain Val on the Pollution-Solution Pump-out Boat. |
New "Because We Love Barnegat Bay" Video Series
More than 100 years ago, a newspaper editor looking to attract readers told his staff, "Use a picture! It's worth a thousand words." Not much has changed since then, except now he might say, "Use a Video!".
"Because We Love Barnegat Bay" is a new series of Barnegat Bay Partnership videos that captures the stories of people dedicated to protecting and restoring the bay. We wanted to share the everyday experiences of our partners and show you why they love the bay.
The seventeen 30-second videos in the series are available on the
BBP's YouTube channel.
Follow field technicians trudging through the wetlands, see a decoy carver demonstrate his craft at Tuckerton Seaport
, watch ReClam the Bay volunteers teach children about shellfish in the bay, and much more.
For some, it's their life's work as environmentalists. For others, it's a chance to give back as volunteers.
For all of them, it's because THEY LOVE BARNEGAT BAY!
We encourage you to share and use these videos on your websites and social media sites, in classroom presentations, or when meeting with any group which has an interest in the protection and conservation of the Barnegat Bay.
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As part of our long-term monitoring program, the BBP continued monitoring juvenile fish populations in the nearshore areas of the bay in 2016. You may have seen our field technicians and volunteers at beaches and parks throughout the bay pulling in the seine net and sorting and identifying the catch. We have been seining sixteen sites every two weeks from May through October, recording the abundance and size of each fish, crab, and jellyfish species captured and then releasing them.
While we find some similar species at every site, we occasionally get something surprising in the net. One of this year's surprising catches was a lined seahorse (
Hippocampus erectus).
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Seahorses
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Lined seahorse
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The lined seahorse is a common and widely distributed fish found from Nova Scotia to Venezuela. Seahorses live in aquatic vegetation, such as seagrass, or on complex living substrates, such as sponges or coral. In the Barnegat Bay we find them in eelgrass beds, where they use their curved, flexible tails to attach to the plants.
Seahorses eat plankton and small crustaceans as they drift by, using their elongated snouts to suck them in. Seahorses are slow swimmers, moving forward using their dorsal (back) fin and moving up and down by adjusting the volume of air in their swim bladders (an air pocket inside their bodies).
The
seahorse is one of the few animal species on earth in which the male bears the unborn young. A female seahorse lays her eggs in a pouch on a male's abdomen; he carries the eggs until they hatch, releasing tiny, fully-formed seahorses.
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Summer Visitors
This summer we also caught some species common to the southeastern U.S. coast. They enter the bay as planktonic larvae in spring and summer, then leave in fall as juveniles or adults when the water temperatures drop.
The American halfbeak (Hyporhamphus meeki) has a pointed lower jaw with a little red around the bottom that looks like lipstick. This species is often used as a baitfish, and while common, is thought to be sensitive to changes in water quality.
We also caught juvenile striped burrfishes (Chilomycterus schoepfii), a type of pufferfish. The green and yellow (and "squishy") juveniles look different than the adults, which have wavy stripes and are covered with short, sharp spines.
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Juvenile striped burrfish
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American halfbeak |
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These fish species, and many others, depend on seagrass beds and other critical bay habitats for their survival. The easiest way to protect seagrasses is by preventing damage in the first place. For boaters, that means operating in marked channels and staying out of shallow seagrass beds, which can be easily damaged by vessels or mooring chains scraping on the bay bottom. This damage can last for years, and areas with severe scarring may never recover.
The BBP will use the data collected in the seining surveys to help identify trends in populations of Barnegat Bay species, and to ask questions about the effects of changing water quality, habitat alteration, and climate change on the bay's fauna.
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"Reel Fun Fishing"
In 2015, Mike and Debbie Bennett of Boating Education and Rescue (BEAR) received a Barnegat Bay Partnership Communication and Education grant to bring their educational presentation, "Everything Eventually Ends Up in the Water," to communities in the upper part of the Barnegat Bay watershed.
As part of their project, the Bennetts started the "Reel Fun Fishing" Club to provide Lakewood youth with environmental education and recreational opportunities. The popular club, which is part of the "Hooked on Fishing - Not on Drugs" Program, has about 45 members and meets every other week at Ocean County Park. The kids and their families have been learning about nature and environmental stewardship through a variety of outdoor activities both at the park and on the bay, including fishing, crabbing, seining, camping, archery, and nature walks. They also give back to the community and the park by regularly participating in clean-ups.
To celebrate the end of the summer, 25 Reel Fun Fishing Club members and their families enjoyed a free half-day ocean fishing trip on the Gambler, a 90-foot recreational fishing boat run by Captain Bob Bogan. Education was an important part of the day. They learned about marine life from Cindy Claus, Director of Jenkinson's Aquarium; fishing techniques from Howard Nebling, NJDEP's Youth Urban Fishing Program; and boating safety from Chief Warrant Officer Sparkman, Commanding Officer of the Manasquan Coast Guard Station.
For more information about programs offered by the Bennetts, contact them at BEAR@boatingeducationandrescue.org.
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Meet the 2016-2017 Barnegat Bay Watershed Ambassador
The Barnegat Bay Partnership, host agency for the Barnegat Bay Watershed Ambassador, welcomes Danielle Fadeski as she begins her term of service with the AmeriCorps Watershed Ambassador Program.
AmeriCorps is a national service initiative that engages more than 70,000 Americans each year in volunteer service that benefits education, public safety, health, homeland security, and the environment.
The
NJ Watershed Ambassador Program is an AmeriCorps program designed to promote watershed stewardship through education and community outreach. An ambassador is assigned to each of the state's 20 main watersheds. The ambassadors educate people about how they can help reduce sources of water pollution; they also conduct biological and visual stream assessments to help monitor the health of New Jersey's waterways.
"I am excited to be a part of this program," Danielle said, "and I look forward to helping raise awareness about water quality within our great watershed. Keep a look-out for upcoming community events such as park clean-ups, dune grass plantings, and rain barrel workshops. If you are interested in scheduling a presentation for a school or organization or collaborating on a community event, please contact me at ambassadorwma13@gmail.com or
732-914-8116."
Danielle graduated from Kean University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Earth Science with a concentration in Meteorology. She is a resident of the Barnegat Bay watershed and spends her free time playing frisbee, kayaking, and hiking local parks.
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