Fishers Island Fire Department maintains careful control over planned burning in the Parade Grounds Sanctuary in March. Jane Ahrens Photo

By Tom Sargent
President, Fishers Island Conservancy

March 25, 2021

Among the many things that were delayed by the pandemic was the annual spring burn of the Parade Grounds Sanctuary grassland. This critical land management tool has been undertaken for generations.

Set fires are a natural way to remove woody plants and invasive species as well as a way to release natural nitrogen back to the soil. Typically the Fishers Island Conservancy burns only 1/3 of the acreage so any grassland dwellers have plenty of room to relocate. Fire is a part of the natural world and birds and animals have evolved to respond to these rhythms. The burn is our most effective weapon in managing this native habitat. Last year, as the shutdowns loomed, we were forced to abandon this annual rite.

What a difference a year makes

On a chilly early spring evening this past week, our friends and partners at the Fishers Island Fire Department pulled up with their crew and equipment. Led by Chief Jeff Edwards and the Conservancy’s own Donnie Beck, they began by back-burning near Elizabeth Field and then progressed towards the center of the Sanctuary.

Once creating these fire breaks, they moved east towards South beach, setting controlled small fires along the way. The wind took over and spurred these fires across the center of the Sanctuary. The sound of the waves, the spring peepers, and the crackling of the fires was astounding. The choreography of the fire department was fantastic to see and it seemed as though half the island turned out to watch the dance.

They marshaled the fire through the Parade Grounds, never letting this new found predator out of their grasp. Flames, heat, and smoke roared as the monster consumed its prey. Then suddenly, it was over. Only smoke, ash, and small pits of flame remained as the beast was satiated. All was calm and quiet. The Red Wings returned to their perches calling out their territories. The peepers chorus, never disrupted, continued their spring song. We watched as the silhouettes of the firefighters moved slowly to their trucks, flashing lights doused, the rumbling of their diesel engines disappearing into the dusk.

To witness a short intense grassfire is to be filled with fear and awe. To watch it under controlled settings with the oversight of an experienced fire crew is to be filled with admiration and gratitude. So, THANK YOU to the Fishers Island Fire Department for all they do for the Fishers Island Conservancy and the community as a whole. It is partnerships like these that make Fishers Island such a special place. We are all friends and neighbors who share a common love for the island. Here’s to spring and an end to the pandemic and being once again able to gather with old friends.

A healthy manatee drifts under dock in Vero Beach, FL amidst reflections of boats on lifts. Disappearing seagrass causing a feeding crisis for manatees is farther up the east coast near Merritt Island. FIConservancy Photo.

Manatees are starving to death in Florida. These gentle giants, weighing up to 1200 pounds, feed almost exclusively on seagrass and eat 9 percent of their body weight everyday.

Seagrass has long been in trouble in Florida’s increasingly polluted Indian River Lagoon Estuary. But scientists say that this year, in main manatee feeding areas, there’s almost no seagrass left for these herbivores to eat, causing them to become “severely emaciated” and die.

Fishers Island seagrass does not have to support the voracious appetites of manatees, but “our” seagrass forms the base of a highly productive marine food web, providing foraging areas and shelter for young fish and invertebrates, and food for migratory waterfowl and sea turtles.

This unique habitat also improves water quality by filtering polluted runoff, absorbing excess nutrients, storing greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, and trapping sediment, reducing the force of wave energy, thereby reducing coastal erosion.

Fishers Island has 94 percent of the remaining eelgrass in New York waters of Long Island Sound and 25 percent of all eelgrass in the Sound. (Eelgrass is a form of seagrass and gets its name from its long, eel-like leaves.)

Decimation of once abundant and protective eelgrass meadows in Long Island Sound, prompted The Nature Conservancy to evaluate eelgrass areas and boating patterns around Fishers Island. The study concluded that boating activity, particularly in summer months, presents a grave threat to Fishers Island eelgrass meadows.

The Fishers Island Seagrass Management coalition has been working to raise awareness about the serious threat to seagrass, and to designate seagrass management areas (SMA) to guide and balance effective use and protection of seagrass ecosystems around Fishers Island.

The loss of seagrass along any shore, whether through pollution or summer boating, is a recipe for irreparable environmental harm.

Tread Lightly: It’s Mating Season

Mating ritual of least terns on South Beach. “What wild creature is more accessible to our eyes and ears, as close to us and everyone in the world, as universal as a bird?” said Nature Historian David Attenborough. Todd McCormack Photos…View McCormack Fishers Island portfolio here.

With time, patience and a camera, seasonal resident and amateur photographer Todd McCormack headed to South Beach and was rewarded with the courting ritual of least terns.

“From what I could tell, there were two male suitors at first. Elaborate dances took place circling each other, one without and then with the fish offering,” Mr. McCormack said.

Least terns are the smallest of all terns and have a clearly defined mating ritual. Once the circling is complete and an appropriate mate is selected, the male, with a small fish in its beak, stands on the back of the female waving the fish back and forth like watching a long point at Wimbledon.

The signal to copulate is when the female rotates her head toward the male and eats the fish.

“It was all pretty fun to watch,” Mr. McCormack said. “For me, it seems one of the things the Fishers Island Conservancy does is encourage people to be in nature while respecting and observing its mysteries.”

After an absence of many years, a breeding pair of least terns was sighted in Sanctuary of Sands, South Beach, June 2018. These birds breed between April and August, usually remaining within the breeding territory between 3 and 5 months. Please leash dogs and tread carefully, particularly on the western end of South Beach (Sanctuary of Sands), where least tern and piping plover nests are mere scrapes in the sand.

In photos below, Todd McCormack observes the mysteries of nature (clockwise from left): male tern with fish prepares for mating ritual, tern in flight with small fish, piping plover chick not far from its nest (near tern nests), tern “challenging” photographer, beach walker keeps safe distance offering a size contrast between man and little nine-inch bird.

Sent as eBlast 3/23/21

This young barred owl is typical of birds of prey at risk of ingesting anticoagulant rodenticides used to kill nuisance rodents, like mice and rats. Justine Kibbe Photo

Scientists agree that there is no such thing as a safe poison. That unfortunate truth applies to anticoagulant rodenticides (AR), which have been used for decades to kill nuisance rodents like mice and rats.

Rodenticides are anti-coagulants placed in bait stations to attract mice and rats. After feeding, rodents die from internal bleeding, but not immediately. While still alive, they are a food source for raptors, and after death, for scavengers. Ingestion transfers the poison to the birds.

A 2020 Tufts Wildlife Clinic study reported that 100 percent of the red-tailed hawks in the study tested positive for exposure to anticoagulant rodenticides. For the study, Clinic Director Maureen Murray, a wildlife veterinarian, sampled 43 red-tailed hawks, which were admitted to the clinic but did not survive due to their injury or illness.

Ms. Murray focused on these hawks, because they are most commonly seen at the clinic and are generalist predators, which offered a sense of how widespread the contamination is in the food chain.

“The ability of these rodenticides to permeate the food chain and ecosystems is pretty remarkable,” said Ms. Murray. “Other studies have shown residues in songbirds and insects. And that’s what this study reflects. Red-tailed hawks eat a lot of small mammals, but they also eat birds, reptiles, or amphibians that they might scavenge. Ultimately, their prey base is very contaminated.”

First generation ARs, chlorpophacinone, diphacinone and warfarin, were followed in the 1970s by a second generation of more toxic anticoagulant rodenticides (SGAR), brodifacoum, bromadiolone, difenacoum, difethialone. This study found that SGARs were more prevalent in the hawks than ARs.

In 2008, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) began tightening rules regarding sales and use of SGARs. This study’s findings are meant to measure the effectiveness of the EPA’s approach to regulating SGARs in preventing exposure of wildlife species.

Ms. Murray encouraged anyone looking for pest control solutions to consider approaches other than ARs: Find out where the mice or rats are coming in, plug up holes in the house or around windows, take away food and water sources, and clean out nesting sites.

Robins Are Unwitting Enablers of Wildly Invasive Chinese Privet Shrub

Blurry black images (l) are winter robins regurgitating and dispersing seeds of highly invasive Chinese privet shrub, Feb. 13 (r). Tom Sargent Photos

Robins, the first signs of spring, actually spend winters in the north, if food sources are plentiful. On Fishers Island, that is not a problem. There is a seemingly endless supply of fat berries that carpet invasive Chinese privet shrubs in winter.

Notorious for producing dense thickets, the Chinese privet, found throughout Fishers Island, is choking out native plants that provide food for native insects, which in turn provide food for bird hatchlings.

Ironically, the robins pictured above are spreading the very seeds that can lead to fewer insects needed to feed their young. The robins are regurgitating Chinese privet berries, which are filled with seeds, further spreading growth of the wildly invasive Chinese privet, known for its aggressive growth, prolific root and stump sprouting, copious seed production, and widespread seed dispersal by birds.

The robin has a long and especially stretchy esophagus, so it can store many berries quickly. After some preliminary digestion, it regurgitates the seeds, making more room for more berries. Robins also can consume huge quantities of berries before nightfall in winter, allowing  them to survive cold temperatures until they can eat again at daybreak.

In addition to the privet’s impact on natural landscapes, its blue berries are toxic to humans (and dogs) and can cause symptoms such as nausea, headache, abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhea, weakness and low blood pressure.

Chinese Privet was introduced into the United States in the 1800s as an ornamental plant primarily used as a privacy hedge. Privet usually grows from 5 to 12 feet but can grow as tall as 30 feet.

This map is an interactive community-based visual that will show each person’s contribution to planting native by state, county and zip code. It is a way for individuals to see their efforts as part of a greater whole, as part of a community that wants to do something purposeful and see tangible results.

Nationally recognized entomologist Doug Tallamy and business entrepreneur Michele Alfandari, have launched Homegrown National Park™, a program that encourages everyone with access to a patch of earth to help sustain biodiversity by removing most invasive plants and starting new habitats of native plants.

Doug Tallamy is a professor of entomology at University of Delaware and, for many years, has consulted with the Fishers Island Conservancy on its grassland restoration initiative in the Parade Grounds area. He has also advised Island landowners on the best way to begin planting native.

During his many visits to Fishers Island, Dr. Tallamy spoke about the vast wasteland of residential lawns in the United States and his hope to have landowners plant native species, even on only parts of the properties. This initiative at last formalizes his longtime goal of achieving 20 million acres of native plantings across the United States.

“This represents approximately half of the green lawns of privately-owned properties and is the largest cooperative conservation project ever conceived or attempted,” Dr. Tallamy said.

“Our National Parks, no matter how grand in scale are too small and separated from one another to preserve species to the levels needed.  Thus, the concept for Homegrown National Park™ is a bottom-up call-to-action to restore habitat where we live and work, extending national parks to our yards and communities. 

“Recent headlines about global insect declines, the impending extinction of one million species worldwide, and three billion fewer birds in North America are a bleak reality check about how ineffective our current landscape designs have been at sustaining the plants and animals that sustain us.

“We are at a critical point of losing so many species from local ecosystems that their ability to produce what sustains us–oxygen, clean water, flood control, pollination, pest control, carbon storage, etc.–will become seriously compromised.

“Homegrown National Park™-Start a new HABITAT™ has no political, religious, cultural or geographic boundaries, because everyone–every human being on this planet–needs diverse, highly productive ecosystems to survive,” Dr. Tallamy said.

Doug Tallamy and Michele Alfandari have launched Homegrown National Park™, a program that aims to cover 20 million acres of formerly green lawns with native plants that will attract native insects, a critical early step in our food chain. Dr. Tallamy has written, among other books, the award-winning Bringing Nature Home and the bestseller Nature’s Best Hope, both recommended as excellent holiday gifts!

Buoy Tree: Community Collaboration At Its Best

The Fishers Island community generously donated time and resources to create the festive Buoy Tree currently on display at the Parade Grounds. (l) First day of buoy installation Nov. 21. Jane Ahrens Photo (r) Buoy Tree nearly completed in early December. Gussie Foshay-Rothfeld Photo

A Buoy Tree has taken center stage on the Parade Grounds west of the State Troopers’ barracks. The tree, nearly completed in early December, exists due to the generous efforts of the Fishers Island community.

Last summer, fishers island.net Editor Jane Ahrens happened to see Michele Klimczak moving buoys out of the Fishers Island Conservancy maintenance shed. Michele clears marine debris from Fishers Island shores for FIConservancy, and the buoys were piling up.

“Michele hoped we could do something better than just toss the buoys into the dumpster,” Jane said. “So we Googled ‘recycle buoys’ and a bunch of Buoy Trees popped up. What a great idea, we thought!”

The first step was getting approval from FIFerry commissioners and FIConservancy President Tom Sargent. FIFerry District manages the Parade Grounds, which are owned by the Town of Southold. FIConservancy restored and maintains the Parade Grounds grasslands.

An informal committee, comprised of Jane, Michele, FIConservancy Executive Director Kristen Peterson and Nate Malinowski, set the project in motion.

Kristen started at Race Rock Garden Co. where Tom Kexel offered to build the support structure. David Burnham helped with building materials and also donated buoys that were in one of his bunkers.

“Our buoy collection continued to grow as Fishers Island Oyster Farm and numerous Island residents, including Joe Rogan and the Gaumonds, dropped off buoys to be painted,” Jane said. “Nate helped figure out how to attach the buoys to the tree, and I have added most of them. Fishers Island Yacht Club, with the help of Manager Beth Arsenault, donated a lot of rope for hanging the buoys, and John Ski gave us some as well.”

A small solar panel with three spotlights illuminate the tree. Jay Cushing and his team at the Electric Company repaired the socket at the base of the nearest streetlamp to supply electricity. When the tree is completed, strings of white lights donated by Our Lady of Grace Rummage, will circle the tree.

“The best part is that so many people have painted beautiful buoys for the tree, including Mrs. Sawyer’s art students from Fishers Island School. I have the names of about 60 people who have painted buoys, and there are more that have been dropped off but with no name,” Jane said.

“There are about 125 buoys on the tree so far. Every time I go to the tree, or open the trunk of my car, there are more buoys. Several have been painted and sent back to the Island—wonderful!”

December 6, 2020

Coyote at Middle Farms Driving Range, Nov. 1, 2020. Prue Gary Photo

A young coyote killed a little dog late Saturday afternoon Oct. 31 at a residence on Clay Point Road at Cedar Ridge Road. The incident occurred 20 feet in front of the owner’s parked car, while the owner was unloading the vehicle. The coyote was not dissuaded by human activity or the presence of large dog. Please be aware of all your small pets.

More and more people have seen coyotes recently on Fishers – in their back yards, and while walking with and without their dogs. See a list below. If you have a sighting please email finyinfo@gmail.com and we will add it to the list.

What should you do if you encounter a coyote? It boils down to this advice:

1. Leash your dog – Pick up and carry a small dog.
2. Stand tall and assertive – Maintain eye contact.
3. Haze the coyote until it leaves the area – make noise, stomp feet, flap jacket, wave flashlight.

Click here for a full report on coyote cautions and sightings on Fishers Island. Above information by Jane Ahrens.