Dodge Paddock Beal Preserve is a small oasis in Stonington Borough and is owned by Avalonia Land Conservancy. With tidal wetlands, coastal grassland and a rocky intertidal area, the area has much to offer visitors. The preserve has been the focus of many efforts involving the land trust, CT Dept of Energy and Environmental Protection, […]
Author: Juliana Barrett
How Healthy Are the Coastal Habitats of Long Island Sound?
This blog is a reposting of a blog published by Georgia Basso and Samantha Brooke, USFWS Coastal habitat are critical to both environmental and human well-being. The importance of the Long Island Sound is reflected in its Congressional designation as an “Estuary of National Significance” in 1987. Photo credit: J. Murray When intense storms hammer […]
My 2017 Climate Corps Summer Internship by Nikki Pirtel
The shoreline community of Westbrook, Connecticut, situated halfway between New Haven and New London, is home to approximately 7,000 residents while supporting seasonal tourists with numerous beaches and shopping stores in the town’s outlet. It is also the municipality I was assigned to research and create a vulnerability assessment for during my time at the […]
Legal Issues in the Age of Climate Adaptation: Four New Legal Fact Sheets
A number of questions were raised at Legal Issues in the Age of Climate Adaptation, a conference held by UConn CLEAR’s and Connecticut Sea Grant’s Climate Adaptation Academy in late 2015. The Marine Affairs Institute & RI Sea Grant Legal Program at Roger Williams University School of Law reviewed the questions, which came from the audience […]
Sunrise, sunset and the Equation of Time
The days are finally getting longer. It is always a slow, subtle and most welcome change from the days of leaving for work in the dark and arriving home again in the dark. Since the winter solstice on December 21, 2016 when the North Pole is tilted furthest from the sun the amount of daylight […]
Seven Signs of Spring in Connecticut
Forget meteorological winter or astronomical winter. When does spring really come to Connecticut and how do we know? We all have our favorites – not walking the dog with a flashlight in the morning, red-winged blackbirds calling, piles of snow are melted, snow drops in bloom… As a New England transplant from the mid-Atlantic, the […]
Monarchs, Pollinators and You!
Let’s do a quick word association: If I say “milkweed” what do you think? For me, the association is always monarch butterflies. I remember walking through fields with my dog looking for monarch caterpillars on the milkweeds, and the thrill of finding the beautiful, incredibly delicate, green chrysalis. Years later, on a fall day, I […]
Living Shorelines and the Connecticut Coast
We know from Storms Irene and Sandy that shoreline erosion is a major issue along the Connecticut coast. Our shoreline has a variety of stabilization structures such as concrete seawalls, revetments and bulkheads interspersed with natural shorelines such as sandy or rocky beaches, tidal marshes and flats and exposed bedrock outcrops. The “hard structures” such […]
Flooding, storms and mold
Are you concerned about your health after severe wet weather has caused your home and/or things in your home to smell moldy??? – UCONN workshop on Nov 14th by Paula Schenck, MPH, University of Connecticut Health Center Living things need food, water, and a comfortable temperature to grow. Mold, the common name for fungi, can […]
Summer’s Last Gasp…
Walks through the woods have certainly changed since early summer. Leaves are changing color and even falling. Squirrels are busily making nests and gathering nuts. But before you turn to picking apples and making pumpkin pie, there are a few summer pleasures still to enjoy. The sites and smells are so different now than they […]