Representatives from the nonprofit Billion Oyster Project (BOP) visited the Salt Marsh Nature Center on Sunday, Dec. 8, to engage visitors with their goal of getting one million people to restore one billion oysters to the New York Harbor by 2035.

“This is a brief introduction to the Billion Oyster Project,” BOP Senior Stewardship Community Coordinator Zeke King Phillips said.  “We’re also going to talk specifically about a project in Jamaica Bay, the waters nearby in Paerdegat Basin, and then I will briefly talk about the work that is going on at the Salt Marsh.”

The Salt Marsh Alliance, Inc. (SMA), formed in 2002 to support the Salt Marsh Nature Center, sponsored the event. The center, located at 3301 Avenue U, was established in 2000 and is the largest of New York City’s five nature centers. It is a part of Marine Park, the largest park in Brooklyn that covers an impressive 798 acres — 530 acres of which are a Forever Wild Reserve consisting of pristine grasslands and a salt marsh nestled along the western shoreline of the Jamaica Bay inlet.

“I wanted to make sure that everyone understood the connection between the goals of the Billion Oyster Project and the goals of what we’re trying to do here in the Salt Marsh and how they work together,” SMA Program Director Debra Sturm said. “Because you can’t have the environment you have here without clean water and someplace like the Salt Marsh to do all the great things that you talk about.”

Along with BOP Stewardship Community Coordinator Marcel De Bernardo, they gave a brief history of the project, which began in 2014. With a focus on restoration, education and community engagement, BOP has worked with over 20,000 students and 15,000 volunteers to restore over 150 million oysters to New York Harbor waters.

“There were billions of oysters before they were all harvested or died of the pollution that was dumped into our harbor,” Phillips said of the ambition to restore the oyster population to its former glory.

In large enough numbers to form reefs, oysters provide a vital ecological and environmental role. As one of the most capacious filter feeders, they help clear nitrogen and pollutants such as untreated sewage runoff from the water, as an adult oyster can filter 50 gallons of water a day. Oysters help increase biodiversity and form natural barriers against damaging wave action that results in shore erosion. 

Although oysters can grow on hard substrate like rocks, concrete and shells, oyster shells provide the ideal surface for the oysters to settle on and thrive. The process involves shell collection from local restaurants, diverting over 2.5 million shells from landfills. The shells are left out in the open to be cleaned by natural processes and then by volunteers. 

The shells are placed on three types of fabricated structures to hold the young oysters (spats). The largest is the reef ball, which is about three to four feet in diameter; the mesh cages called Gabions are approximately three feet by four feet; and smaller ORS cages measure 18 inches wide, eight inches tall and eight inches deep. Examples of small-scale models of the structures were passed around for examination. 

“We are transitioning mainly using reef balls because they last longer in the water. It’s a better way to grow an oyster because they’re growing on the surface,” Phillips said. “They can grow more fully and healthily instead of just this little cage, so that is why we’re transitioning to using these primarily.”

Phillips said that the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation requires BOP to monitor the installations yearly. Boats with divers monitor the larger structures, but BOP depends on Oyster Research Station (ORS) volunteers to work with the smaller cages, which are tethered by a line and buoy and easily pulled up from the water, dock or bulkhead. Volunteers also help with water testing, data collection and reporting.

“We are about 150 million oysters as of the end of the season,” Phillips said about the state of the project. BOP has reached about 15% of their goal, with another ten years to go and about nine to a dozen reef sites spread around the harbor. Phillips is optimistic that at the rate that BOP deploys the oysters, it will meet the goal.

Phillips then focused the topic to the surrounding Jamaica Bay area, which has active restoration areas in Paerdegat Basin Field Station, Bayswater Point State Park, Head of Bay and research stations in Paerdegat Basin and Gerritsen Creek.

It is one of four main regional water areas in New York Harbor that BOP has worked on for the past few years to restore self-sustaining oyster populations, with positive trending results. Current plans are to expand on the work and research in Paerdegat Basin and Jamaica Bay  with Congressional funding of nearly $1 million.

Phillips spoke about the ORS project behind the Center in the Gerritsen Creek. Two ORS cages were installed in September 2019 containing two-year-old oysters. Public work and field programs were stopped in March 2020 due to COVID-19 and the site became inactive due to lack of data. Interest was revived in 2023 when park rangers contacted BOP.

BOP plans to revive the work, check on the cages and install two new ORS cages containing 50 oysters each when the weather warms up in the spring and the Center reopens after its winter break. 

Joseph Mikhli, a 20-year Midwood resident who frequents the park said that he knew about the project through a PBS Nature program on television. “It’s important for people to be more aware of the environment, to have more respect for it, and to just be more mindful of their impact on it,” Mikhli said.

BOP collaborates with local schools in School District 22, like nearby P.S. 207, Elizabeth G. Leary and schools in School Districts 15 and 18. Phillips would like to see public programming happening at the Center this spring to get the community involved in visiting and monitoring the oysters, collecting data and volunteering with the BOP. Park rangers and SMA members also expressed enthusiasm for the project.