A few hundred alternative systems are installed on Martha's Vineyard, mostly in Edgartown and Oak Bluffs. The technology could help achieve nitrogen mitigation in Island coastal ponds.
All the saltwater ponds on the Vineyard are impaired to some degree, and each one faces a unique set of conditions. Public interest has reached a tipping point.
Sengekontacket Pond has been closed to shellfishing because of rainfall received earlier this week.
The town of Oak Bluffs has advised that the pond will be closed until at least Monday, August 17.
The state mandates pond closures after heavy rainfall because of run-off from waterfowl and other sources. Red flags fly at both bridges on the pond when it is closed to shellfishing.
While the Vineyard is perhaps best known for the ocean, Vineyarders have deep ties to the ponds that were carved into the Island landscape some 20,000 years ago.
Island ponds are a connection to cultural heritage and a livelihood for fishermen. But housing booms and land-use changes threaten to undo a delicate balance.
Martha’s Vineyard is a bellwether of climate change, sea level rise and socioeconomic dynamics. It also is a place with both the interest in and commitment to dealing with its effects.
On Cape Cod ambitious efforts are underway to remediate ponds and estuaries. And when coastal ponds decline, so do property values, the executive director of the Cape Cod Commission, told a meeting at the Katharine Cornell Theatre.
A pair of quahauggers stood waist-deep in Sengekontacket Pond early Thursday morning, the late August sun glinting off the calm water as they raked hardshell clams, perhaps a basketful for their dinner. The pond has been open to summer shellfishing this year for the first time since 2007.
Putting in Place a Plan to Save Our Ponds Costly and Politically
Tricky, Forum Hears
By CHRIS BURRELL
By the time anyone notices that a coastal pond or bay is choked with
floating drifts of green algae, the events that caused it happened
decades ago.
Nitrogen leaching from septic systems and runoff of pollutants from
black-topped roadways and parking lots did their damage 20 or 30 years
ago, said marine scientist Brian L. Howes, a professor at University of
Massachusetts, Dartmouth.
