New York rebuilds oyster reefs with shells from 100-plus restaurants
This digest was compiled by AI from multiple sources — links to the originals are below.
The Billion Oyster Project has installed 140 million oysters across 18 sites in New York Harbor since 2015. The project collects shells from over 100 partner restaurants to serve as reef foundations. It aims to reach one billion oysters by 2035.
Key Facts
- The Billion Oyster Project has installed 140 million oysters across 18 sites from the Bronx to Staten Island.
- More than 100 partner restaurants have contributed over 2.5 million pounds of shells since 2015.
- The project aims to install one billion oysters in New York Harbor by 2035.
- An adult oyster filters tens of gallons of water per day, removing algae, sediment, and nitrogen.
The Shell Loop
The Billion Oyster Project, run from Governors Island and born out of the Harbor School, collects shells from more than 100 partner restaurants across Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens. Since 2015, over 2.5 million pounds of shells have been collected and trucked to Governors Island, where they cure in the open air for about a year. Oyster larvae require a hard, calcium-rich surface to attach, and the harbor has lacked such surfaces since the old reefs were mined away. The cured shells are placed in tanks of harbor water seeded with millions of hatchery larvae, which attach to the shells before they are returned to the water.
Restoration Progress
The project has installed 140 million oysters, covering roughly 19 acres of young reef across 18 sites from the Bronx to Staten Island. Operations are scaling toward 100 million juveniles per year, the rate needed to reach one billion oysters by 2035. An adult oyster filters tens of gallons of water per day, and the project estimates its animals have processed water by the trillions of gallons. The restored reefs support returning marine life, with oysters acting as a keystone species that benefits the broader food web.
1 source
Time · lag behind first