Tag Archives: coastal resilience

Protecting Salt Marshes at Allens Pond 

Posted on June 8, 2022 by Mass Audubon

Visitors to Mass Audubon’s Allens Pond Wildlife Sanctuary in South Dartmouth and Westport may be curious if they spot groups of individuals digging on the sanctuary’s salt marsh. 

Under the watchful eye of Mass Audubon’s Coastal Resilience Program Director Dr. Danielle Perry and the South East team, they are carving out runnels, shallow channels used to improve waterlogged conditions on the salt marsh by lowering the water table and draining impounded water.  

Climate-related increases in sea level have shown that incoming tides are higher and lasting longer, causing upland areas of the marsh to be flooded more frequently, resulting in the formation of saltwater pools (water impoundments) that remain even when tides recede.  

These water impoundments are having a disastrous effect on the high-marsh ecology, including vegetative die-off and habitat loss. As they literally drown in place, we lose essential salt marsh services such as protection against floods and storms—and as marshes degrade they can release stored carbon and greenhouse gases, contributing to climate change. 

Along with our partners at Save the Bay, Bristol County Mosquito Control, Dartmouth Natural Resources Trust, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, we are utilizing narrow, strategically placed runnels to drain excess sea water into preexisting ditches or creeks that flow into open water. This strategy alleviates stresses on these habitats, which is crucial to the long-term viability of the plants and animals that rely upon them.  

A runnel

For example, Saltmarsh Sparrows are now extremely vulnerable as their nests within the high marsh are more frequently inundated by incoming tides, as sea level rises.  

Creating runnels can be an effective nature-based climate solution, rather than constructing extensive and costly sea walls that further erode the salt marsh. 

Perry and Mass Audubon Director of Conservation Science Jeff Collins hope to use this salt marsh restoration technique and others at additional coastal sanctuaries, including Great Neck in Wareham, Barnstable Great Marsh and Wellfleet Bay on Cape Cod Bay, and Rough Meadows in Rowley on the North Shore. 

My past is my prologue

Posted on January 27, 2021 by Rishya N.

The first time I saw myself as a scientist was at a very young age, inspired by scouting. My two favorite merit badges were Nature and Environmental Science – but earning them took effort and time. I had to pick three different environments and observe patterns in them.

I vividly remember taking my bike out every day to our local salt marsh, each time with a growing curiosity. What would I hear? What new discovery would I make? Scouting taught me that if I take the time to look in nature, I will certainly discover something new.

Tom Eid, Climate Champion.

My childhood experiences come full circle.

While my scouting days are over, the lessons I’ve learned still ring true today: that as a community, we must look to the patterns in nature to understand what is happening to it.

Right now, that means grasping how nature is changing in order to adapt to our changing climate.

I’m Tom Eid and I’m a Climate Champion.

I act on climate by helping increase our collective, scientific understanding of how nature fares in the face of rising seas, warming temperatures, and shifting seasons through community science.

Community science is public participation in scientific research and decision making. It has provided me opportunities to collaborate with experts and help protect the environment. It is science by people to benefit nature.

What I did as a scout was science. The activities I completed were part of the practice of phenological monitoring: the observation of long-term patterns in wildlife behavior to understand nature and its adaptation to environmental threats. Many years later, I still use phenological monitoring to better comprehend how wildlife behavior is affected by the threat of climate change.

A return to the salt marsh

From July through September 2020, I worked with Mass Audubon on its Coastal Salt Marsh Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment project.

There was a beautiful nostalgia in the field at Mass Audubon’s Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary that reminded me of my time scouting. What struck me is that the smell of a salt marsh is the same – no matter where you go or how many years have passed. There’ll always the gentle bending and bowing of salt marsh grasses as the wind blows through. The feeling of the soft, cushion-like peat underneath me. The calls of birds whistling through the air matched with the slight touch of sea salt in the marsh breeze.

While my monitoring as a scout merited me with a badge, these assessments gave me a pathway for climate action. I helped observe nature’s cues, noting shifts in things like where certain marsh plants grow, to inform adaptation strategies that preserve and enhance this critical habitat for people and wildlife. 

The scientist in you

Climate change is our reality: it affects us here and now. We are all responsible for making a difference.

What can you do to act on climate change to ensure a sustainable future for the world around us? Get outside and into nature! Community science can be that opportunity to engage, here’s how to start:

  1. Pursue your passion. What do you love about the environment?
  2. Leverage your skills: What do you bring to the table? How can you engage and educate others about new scientific findings?
  3. Embrace your sector: What type of work do you want to do? Visit Mass Audubon’s website for some ideas.

Together, lets commit to protecting nature. Let’s learn from nature’s patterns and cues, teach each other, and enable current and future generations to act on climate through science.

– Tom Eid, Mass Audubon Community Science Volunteer