Why should we care about the Long Island Sound?
To care about the Long Island Sound, it is important to understand what it is, what’s living inside it, and what it does for our communities. More importantly, though, we need to feel how it touches our lives. Caring about the Long Island Sound is as much about making a personal connection with the land, water, and life as it is about learning the facts. This blog post will try to do both!
For animal lovers: Long Island Sound is the second largest estuary on the east coast of the United States.[1] This brackish water oasis, where rivers meet the ocean, provides a sheltered habitat for animals during critical parts of their development. Fish like striped bass, black seabass, and bluefish rely on small forage fish that feed on the abundant plankton that bloom in the Sound’s nutrient-rich waters. Fan-favorite birds like the great blue heron and snowy egret wade and hunt in its shallow, calm inlets. High in the skies, osprey and bald eagles circle and search until they spot a fish to dive after. Only the Earth’s rainforests support a density of life as substantial as estuaries like the Long Island Sound.[2]
For those who live near the coast: Over 25 million people live within 50 miles of the Long Island Sound.[3] The same coastal habitats that provide refuge for juvenile animals also buffer our coastlines during storms and high tides. The spongy peat sediments beneath salt marsh grasses are highly absorbent; in fact, one mile of salt marsh habitat can absorb one foot of storm surge.[4] Even the tall grasses swaying back and forth in the waves break up the energy those waves carry from storms that could devastate coastal areas. These effects protect our coastal homes, businesses, and communities from floods and erosion.
If you’re a numbers person: Long Island Sound has over 600 miles of coastline, providing recreational space for activities like sportfishing, boating, sailing, swimming, and more.[5] If you’ve ever built a sandcastle, cooled off in the water on a hot summer day, held a hermit crab, or reeled in a fish along some of that coastline, you know it’s hard to put a price on the recreational value of the Sound. But, if you are curious about what it might be, the recreational user value of the Long Island Sound is an estimated $303 million per day. When commercial activities are included, the estimate of the Sound’s total economic value to nearby communities comes to $5.5 billion per year.3
The Sound is an integral part of our local environment, our communities, and our economy. When we care about it, we are more likely to make decisions on the personal and communal scale that ensure its beauty and diversity enrich the lives of generations to come. Let’s aspire to care for the Sound as much as it cares for us, and all the other life beyond us.
[1] National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
[2] NOAA Fisheries
[3] Long Island Sound Partnership
[4] Meigs Point Nature Center
[5] Connecticut Sea Grant
