Rutgers scientists and high school volunteers from Camden are using nature to mitigate the effects of coastal erosion in southern New Jersey.
Together they built a living shoreline, near the New Jersey Aquaculture Innovation Center in Cape May, that uses marsh grasses and recycled oyster and clam shells. The shells, incorporated into modified concrete blocks called oyster castles, fit together like Legos to help reduce wave energy as it comes onto the beach.
This living shoreline allows sand and mud to build up behind it, creating new marshland while also serving as a habitat for oyster larvae to attach and grow, said Jenny P. Shinn, a field researcher with the Haskin Shellfish Research Laboratory – which coordinated the project with students from the Urban Promise Academy in Camden.
Read More at: Rutgers University
Rutgers scientists teamed up with high school students to build a living shoreline, near the New Jersey Aquaculture Innovation Center in Cape May, that helps reduce wave energy as it comes onto the beach. (Photo Credit: Dena Seidel)