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Bunker Fish die-off at Peconic Bay.
Curt Johnson, executive director of Save the Sound, showed a series of heart-breaking photographs at a recent lecture, photos documenting a massive die-off of fish and turtles last year on Long Island Sound, “not far from us,” he said.
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Curt Johnson, executive director of Save the Sound.
Johnson spoke at the Blackstone Memorial Library last week to an audience of about 50 persons, who braved a rainy, windy night to attend his talk, which was sponsored by the Branford Land Trust.
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During the die-off off into the Peconic Estuary last May, thousands of dead bunker fish were found on beaches two weeks after hundreds of diamondback turtles washed up dead nearby. The Peconic Bay is located on the New York side of the Sound.
Save the Sound filed a legal petition with the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) after the die-off seeking a comprehensive plan to combat the nitrogen problem. The petition said that the amount of nitrogen flowing in to the sound was in excess of federal standards.
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“In our legal petition to the EPA last May, we said we have got to have a comprehensive plan in moving forward. This nitrogen is the single biggest threat to our ecological health here in the Sound,” Johnson said. About half-dozen other environmental groups, based in Connecticut and New York signed on.
Johnson said he was now relieved to report to the audience that the EPA in mid-February announced a new strategy to reduce excess nitrogen in the Sound. The plan met with approval and the eight groups involved in the action withdrew legal action on the petition, saying they supported the government’s effort. The government plan includes confronting sources of contamination beyond New York and Connecticut, states that drain to Long Island Sound. The petitioners will re-instate the petition only if the EPA strategy is not implemented or enforced.
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A turtle and a clam.
The nitrogen comes from septic systems, storm-water runoff, and sewage plants. As a result an excess of algae in the water occurs.
What happens, Johnson said, is that turtles eat shellfish, which are made poisonous by the algae bloom and suffocate because the water has a low oxygen levels as a result of red tide. “The food turtles feed on had been poisoned by little tiny snails and little tiny clams that turtles feed on. So when the turtles fed on them they died,” he said.
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Farm River Marsh
Johnson also spoke about the nearby Farm River, which flows into the Sound. The river separates Branford from East Haven. Recently some of its marshes experienced sluffing and dying off. Johnson said nitrogen was a substantial cause of this die-back.
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