The Providential Gardener

Coastweeks 2007 ~ A Celebration of the Coast

There are so many events coming up as part of Coastweeks 2007—A Celebration of the Coast, from September 15 through October 13, that I must give you fair warning!

Take out your calendar and check out their calendar on the Rhode Island Sea Grant website and make your plan. Here is some of what's growing on along the shore during those weeks:

• Historic Lighthouse Tours
• Boat tours of the Blackstone River Valley
• Hikes, walks through salt marshes, preserves, and along the shore,
• Kayak trips
• Lectures on aquaculture, oyster gardening, Bay water quality
• Coastal cleanups
• Shoreline Biathlon
• Book discussions
• Garden tours
• Commercial Fishing Trawl
• FOOD!
• Several birding events
• Fairs, Harvest Festivals
• Prudence Island Bicycle Tour
• Waterscape/Streetscape Symposium in Newport

Wow! I will put some of this into the Providential Gardener Calendar, but scan through the Coastweeks events list and enjoy our great little state's 400 miles of coastline this fall.

The Importance of Wetlands...

You can find articles on the environment everywhere, including in most issues of the Providence Business Journal. Recently Robert W. Varney, regional administrator of EPA's New England office in Boston, wrote a guest column, "Honoring a legacy by protecting valuable wetlands." The legacy is Rachel Carson's ~ she would have been 100 in May ~ and the wetlands would be the "Borderlands....the largest ecologically intact forested system between Boston and Washington, D.C.," located on the Connecticut and Rhode Island border in South County.

The Borderlands project is described in a 2003 RI DEM report, "South County Greenspace Protection Strategy." It takes a while to open because it's 69 pages long. The Borderlands wetlands help ensure clean drinking water and reduce the impact of storm floods, and in particular, it protects the underlying aquifer which is an important source of drinking water.

Rhode Island Cultured Shellfish

No, this post is not about well-educated clams ~ excuse me, this is Rhode Island ~ quahogs. I am looking at an Ocean State Aquaculture Association (OSAA) brochure I picked up at Agriculture Day at the State House in May entitled "Enjoy Rhode Island Cultured Shellfish."  These shellfish include the oysters, mussels, and hard-shell clams (we call them quahogs) raised on Rhode Island's farms that are actually IN the bay.

The brochure lists nine OSAA member farms, most of which may give tours if you request. I only found websites for three of these farms:

Pollution, Coastlines, and Invasive Species

Here are other comments on some recent Providence Journal articles. And by the way, there are a lot of environmental issues and wouldn't it be great if Projo produced many more!

Current events can be complex, and we count on news reporting to be balanced, or at least to start shining light on issues. Not having conducted my own research on these topics, I don't have positions on them, but there are basic principles that come from common sense, and most of us share these principles and sense. Having started this paragraph by noting complexity, life is nonetheless simple as well.

DEM & Tiverton

HEALTHY HOMES AND [MILLION] DOLLAR BILLS: Several recent Projo articles have reported on the RI Department of Environmental Management's contract with an out of state law firm to bring its case against Southern Union, which now owns Fall River Gas. None of us would like to discover that we own property that we are forbidden to dig in because of toxic chemicals being deposited there 50 years ago. And Rhode Island taxpayers cannot be happy about the costs involved in this lawsuit. We expect state employees and elected officials to manage money wisely.

CRMC & CLF

KEEPING THE BIG PICTURE IN MIND: Another Projo article reported that The Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) is asking for an investigation of the Coastal Resources Management Council's (CRMC) decisions in 18 cases. Agencies like CRMC hear proposals to override existing regulations, and surely the requestors and their lawyers can make good cases. But in regard to our coastal lands, when you make one exception, then it's a little easier to make another exception, and then another.... So before long, so much shoreland can be developed or altered that the entire Narragansett Bay will be unable to cope with a major storm surge during a hurricane. Folks, that undeveloped shoreline is the natural flood plain for the high water of occasional megastorms. This very problem was a contributing cause to the New Orleans disaster, wasn't it? The shore buffer zones and regulations preventing shore development have a sound basis. And who knows? If Rhode Island kept to a conservative shoreline development policy, that could have a positive impact on the problem of rising insurance rates or no available insurance for shore properties.

Invasive Species

PREPAREDNESS: Besides news in the paper, there are the editorials and commentaries, the op-ed pieces. One recent commentary by David  W. Gregg of the Rhode Island Natural History Survey (RINHS) negatively compared Rhode Island to Massachusetts when it comes to dealing with invasive species:

"...Rhode Island, by contrast [with Massachusetts], has only a rudimentary invasive-species education program, a patchwork of prevention regulations, and neither a coordinated monitoring system nor a rapid-response plan...."

Are there other dimensions or sides to this problem? Comment on this post! Do you know anything about RINHS's Invasive Species Preparedness Strategy for Rhode Island? Here is the link to the RINHS page for the Rhode Island Invasive Species Portal. 

India Point Park ~ Moratorium Hearing

Note: The Providential Gardener will post notices of relevant meetings in the public interest. Send  meeting info.

From David Riley, of Friends of India Point Park (Providence)

Dear Friends of India Point Park,

Providence City Council Public Hearing  next MONDAY, 6/25, 6 PM, Council Chambers, City Hall, 3rd floor (see attached public notice).

   Subject: proposed Moratorium on waterfront development south of I-195, pending completion of the Comprehensive & Neighborhood Plans. This moratorium will give us a chance to plan carefully for the future of the strategically located waterfront between the Seekonk & Providence Rivers.

If ever there was a PRIME TIME TO SHOW YOUR SUPPORT for waterfront public space, this is one of those times!  PLEASE come. Everyone will have a chance to be heard.

The area's importance as the gateway to the head of the Bay gives it the potential to be a public attraction with major benefits to the City and the region for generations to come. This opportunity will be lost forever if we allow development to wall off the waterfront and block what will be the city's most spectacular view down the Bay from the new I-195. Hope to see you there!  ~ David

David Riley
Co-Chair, Friends of India Point Park
PO Box 603172, Providence, RI 02906
401 521-7929 ~ info@friendsofindiapointpark.org

www.friendsofindiapointpark.org

Rhode Island Watershed Update

Here is another thing to do in the off-garden-season: find out what is going on with our rivers and watersheds. The Rhode Island Rivers Council website lists several watersheds ~ you live in or near one, and whatever fertilizers you put on your lawn are ending up in the rivers and the bay. Here are the watersheds listed on the RI Rivers Council:

• Aquidneck Island Watershed
• Buckeye Brook Watershed
• Blackstone River Watershed
• Hunt River Watershed
• Kickemuit River Watershed
• Moshassuck Watershed
• Narrow River Watershed
• Pawtuxet River Watershed
• Salt Ponds Watershed
• Saugatucket River Watershed
• Ten Mile River Watershed
• Wood-Pawcatuck Watershed
• Woonasquatucket River Watershed

For a small state, that's a long list! Each of the links above gives a description, history, water quality (including pathogens, nutrients, and metals), management, organizations, links and contact information.

The Providential Gardener Condensed Events list watershed organization meetings when I know about them. Today I had an email about the annual meeting of Friends of the Moshassuck on March 3, in Providence. Call or email Greg Gerritt if you are interested in attending (401-331-0529).

Rhode Island Watersheds - Postscript

The last posting must have been too long, because it wouldn't take this info: Save the Bay's Eelgrass Restoration projects need volunteers. Here are the upcoming dates for planting eelgrass, and by the way, kayakers and experienced scuba divers are welcome. You can have fun and get some good work done at the same time. What could be better? Some work is done on shore, but most of this work involves getting into the water, which sure sounds like a good idea today and tomorrow, when the temperature is going into the upper 90s or (gasp) over 100.

Thursday, August 17: HARVEST at URI's Graduate School of Oceanography
Friday, August 18: TRANSPLANT at Coggeshall Point (meet at the Bay Center at 8:30 am)
Saturday, August 19: TRANSPLANT at Prudence Island (meet at the Bay Center at 8:30 am)
Monday, September 4: HARVEST at Fort Getty, Jamestown
Tuesday, September 5: HARVEST at Fort Getty, Jamestown
Wednesday, September 6: TRANSPLANT at Prudence Island (meet at the Bay Center at 8:30 am)
Thursday, September 7: TRANSPLANT at Coggeshall Point (meet at the Bay Center at 8:30 am)

Rhode Island Watershed Restoration Projects

They say to follow the money, which is always a good idea, but I also follow the links. Yesterday I got an email newsletter, The Runoff Rundown, from The Center for Watershed Protection (CWP), located in Maryland, but with a national agenda. Usually I will skip the national groups and focus only on Rhode Island activities, but I found some Rhode Island information through this newsletter that I want to share, a list of Watershed Restoration Projects in the works in Rhode Island.