Talk NERRdy to Me: Rebecca Roth
NERRA’s raving and roving reporter Nik Charov spoke with Rebecca Roth, NERRA’s executive director. They talked about her life in coasts, the best Dr. Seuss story of all time, and …
DC Download: April 2023
April showers brought another NERRd call to action: The FY 2024 President’s Budget did not increase the NERRS operations budget from FY 2023, and it cut the NERRS PAC budget …
BIL & IRA Funds to Transform Coastal Resilience
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced it will invest $77 million this year in National Estuarine Research Reserves (NERRS) and Coastal Zone Management (CZM) programs to advance high impact …
Communities are for critters (& science)
Reserves around the country transform this passion for wildlife into community science to support an ever-growing body of knowledge about these special estuary residents and how we can make …
Community-Informed Science in Florida
In summer 2021, a group of land managers and scientists at Florida’s Guana Tolomato Matanzas (GTM) Reserve spotted some wetland ponding behind huge piles of oyster shells. Known as rakes, …
Community Science Fills in the Gaps
It’s spring, and Becky Swerida has organized a local treasure hunt. Not for gold or jewels, but for bubbles. Specifically, the bubbles that pop up on the seagrasses that grow …
Local Partnerships Create National Impact
How will coastal management meet 21st century challenges? Through community—a community of partners working locally and coming together nationally for greater impact.
Talk NERRdy to Me: Kevin O’Brien and Jamie Vaudrey
This month, NERRA’s roving reporter Nik Charov spoke with Kevin O’Brien, supervising environmental analyst, and Jamie Vaudrey, the first research coordinator at the newly designated Connecticut Reserve.
DC Download: March 2023
With 84 new members in Congress, education is key. We thank the NERRA Board and all friends for continuing to share what happens at Reserves with members of Congress.
Heroes of Old Woman Creek
Every estuary needs heroes—not only to help protect these special places, but to inspire the rest of us. Congratulations to Rudy and Joli Reising and Bill Pifer, the 2023 Heroes of the Friends of Old Woman Creek!
The Great Octopus Rescue of 2023
Here’s one for the feel good file: A Giant Pacific octopus stranded on a Washington state beach was saved by a little girl, park staff, and personnel from the Padilla Bay Reserve.
Shaping Tomorrow’s Coastlines
Olivia Won is working to shape a more equitable future for the Bay Area by integrating principles of social and environmental justice into shoreline adaptation planning.
NERRA Board Members Talk Plastics in Mexico City
NERRA president Jace Tunnell and vice president Kristen Goodrich presented at a workshop in Mexico City about their efforts to expand plastics and debris clean up in the country.
Some Like it Cold
The conventional wisdom around harmful algal blooms is that they like it hot, ostensibly explaining why big blooms tend to show up in warmer months. However, a new study led by Wisconsin’s Lake Superior Reserve’s has shown …
DC Download: February 2023
Thank you to all the Reserve friends and partners around the country who came together to make the #IHeartEstuaries social media campaign such a success.
Balancing sustainability and profit in Texas
In 1991, the late Brien O’Connor Dunn made an unusual decision. A sixth generation Texan and descendant of the state’s largest land owner, Dunn chose Fennessey Ranch as his inheritance.
Advancing wetland restoration science
A recent paper in Estuaries and Coasts sheds light on the practice of adding sediment onto marsh surfaces as a strategy to help them keep pace with rising seas.
Data for a Healthy Chesapeake Bay
While others might cheer the spring return of warmer temperatures to Virginia’s Lower Potomac, A.J. Erskine eyes the related runoff with a bit of concern.
Connect to Protect
An acre a day. That’s how quickly natural lands are being lost in New Hampshire’s coastal watershed due to development. To help protect these places for the future, the Great Bay Reserve …
Talk NERRdy to Me: Julie Binz
This month, NERRA’s roving reporter Nik Charov spoke with Julie Binz, manager at the ACE Basin Reserve in South Carolina. They talked about confounding geography, environmental education, human dimensions, and a certain graduate program every wannabe-NERRd should know.
DC Download: January 2023
The Reserve System, and the thousands who support it, is a constant force for positive change—and it’s growing. In support of this, NERRA’s request for the NERRS FY 2024 budget is $47M for operations (ORF) and $10M for PAC.
Nurdle Patrol is Growing
When Wyvette Robinson heard about the Mission-Aransas Reserve’s Nurdle Patrol on Facebook, she was intrigued. Not only is plastic pollution a big deal for her organization, any opportunity to share new education tools and resources with Mississippi teachers and students gets her “pumped.”
Building Resilience Through Community on Deal Island
As sea levels rise and the lands of the Chesapeake region sink, the residents of Deal Island are working with Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay Reserve to use natural infrastructure to defend their communities.
Keeping Wetland Carbon in the Bank
Wetlands are custodians of a greenhouse gas heavyweight—methane. Understanding which types of wetlands emit methane, where they are, and whether these emissions are natural or caused by people is critical information …
Reading the Tea Leaves
Tea leaves aren’t just good for predicting our future, they also can help us predict the future condition of marshes. Exhibit A: researchers at Reserves across the System are using tea bags as part of an international experiment …