William Floyd Middle School Students Seed Shinnecock Bay With Hard Shell Clams

William Floyd School District Photo  |  William Floyd Middle School students seeding clams.
William Floyd School District Photo | William Floyd Middle School students seeding clams.

Mastic Beach – Recently, 48 William Floyd Middle School students under the guidance of science teachers Robert Mozer, CPG, Ezia Gillan and Christina Nugent, as well as Principal Carolyn Schick, had the opportunity to participate in in a project to seed the Shinnecock Bay with 36,000 hard shell seed clams in an effort to help restore both the water quality and fisheries of the bay.

Partnering with the Stony Brook University School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences (SoMAS), students boarded two Research Vessels – the RV Peconic and the RV Shinnecock – for an afternoon of real hands-on science. The project will be monitored by the students and staff of SoMAS who return to the clam sanctuary locations to collect data on the water quality and health of the clam population. Clams act as natural filters helping to cleanse water with too much nitrogen and are expected to remove some of the harmful algae that results in red, brown and rust tides.

“It was a great experience for both the kids and the adults to actively participate in a ‘hands-on’ science experiment to see if the clams can do the job,” said Mr. Mozer. “With the forthcoming William Floyd Middle School science research club, I plan to have students follow-up with the SoMAS team to look at the data and see if there have been any changes to the water quality over time. We couldn’t have picked a better day to be ‘in the field’ conducting real science.”

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