The Mast-Head: Wither the Eelgrass

There’s no eelgrass to speak of anymore. Baymen and researchers have been saying this for some time, but it is nonetheless strange to think about. 

Growing up along the shore of Gardiner’s Bay, I saw sea grass accumulate in foot-thick mats along the wrack line in the late fall every year. As each growing season closed, the grass would float, knot up, and be blown ashore by the wind.

These were our autumn leaf piles in a place without many deciduous trees and where the oak leaves that did fall would blow away. As children, my siblings and I liked to bounce up and down on the eelgrass windrows and chase each other around, throwing thick handfuls. They would be gone soon enough. Maybe the sand fleas would eat it. Maybe a high tide would just carry it away.

We don’t see the eelgrass anymore. Nor are there underwater fields of it where they used to be. Blaming fingers are pointed at one thing or another these days and a likely suspect is thought to be nitrogen-loaded groundwater that fuels sun-choking algae blooms. But lots of things change along the water’s edge if you watch long enough.

My friend Geoff and I talked at length about this late Sunday while clamming in Three Mile Harbor. Skimmer clams were once abundant here, good for bait and frying. Now it has been years since I have seen one. Blue mussels are gone too. Hard clams are plenty, however, and though we return to the same spots time and again, they do not seem to run out.

Still, we know everything changes. The eelgrass mystery continues to thwart efforts to restore it, and its loss has been noted all along the East Coast. Could the absence of the great masses that died each year and then became part of the detrital food web be the explanation for many of the other losses we see? Perhaps. If there is one thing above all that I would like to see again, this grass is it.