From a distance, they could easily be mistaken for discarded trash bobbing on the surface of the water. When you get closer, though, and get a better look, you realize what you’re looking at: dead fish, often Atlantic menhaden (aka bunker). It can be a troubling sight, for sure, especially when it’s more than a […]
This is a dispatch from Long Island Soundkeeper Bill Lucey In November of this year the Sound was full of menhaden. By full I mean we had reports of huge, continuous schools from the Bronx all the way to Watch Hill and over to the North Fork of Long Island and back down to Hempstead […]
This post comes from Curt Johnson, Executive Director of the Save the Sound program. I have menhaden to thank for a magical day back in August. One day back in August, I arrived at the dock in my hometown on the coast of Long Island Sound to find a stunning great blue heron. The magnificent […]
Last month, boaters in Long Island Sound were astonished to encounter humpback whales in the wild – a rare thrill for humans indicating an increasingly healthy food web in the sensitive waters of the Sound. After decades of absence, whales have started returning to the Sound in recent years to feed on increasing numbers of forage […]
Thousands of us were transfixed and inspired by recent sightings of big marine mammals in Long Island Sound. Our Curt Johnson mediates on what their presence means.
In a move praised by both commercial and conservation interests, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) agreed Tuesday to a ten-percent increase to the total allowable catch (TAC) for Atlantic menhaden.
If you have spent time on Long Island Sound this summer, especially between Rye, New York and Old Saybrook, Connecticut, perhaps you’ve spotted black patches of water among a sea of blue. At closer inspection the dark, nervous water may have appeared moving or boiling with splashes. This is the scene I’ve been witnessing every […]
