Billion Oyster Project!

Second grade is excited to become citizen scientists.  We are joining the Billion Oyster Project (BOP)!  BOP is coordinated by the New York Harbor School whose goal is to restore one billion oysters to New York Harbor by 2035. 

I went to two training sessions at BOP on Governors Island to learn how to care for the oysters that will be in our oyster research station (OPS).

Leaving Manhattan.

15 minutes later, Governors Island.

The oyster nursery at the Harbor School.

Oysters filtering the water.

We went out on pier 101 to learn the protocol for measuring the oysters in the ORS.

Lots of life on this ORS!

We found a crab living amongst the oysters.

We have to count the oysters that are living
and then measure the length of those oysters.

Our oyster research station (ORS) will be located at Brooklyn Bridge Park where we will observe, measure and record data and then share it with BOP.

Our ORS is at the "cut out" near Pier 5!

A week before our first field trip to Brooklyn
Bridge Park, I met with the BOP team who
brought the oysters.

We put 4 bags of oysters in the ORS. The oyster on the bottom
has a blood worm on it.

The ORS is secure.

Into the East River they go. Do your thing oysters!

A shrimp and some oyster drills (not so good for our oysters) were left behind. I put them back in
the water.

Two more trips to Governors Island and back to get oysters for a tank in our classroom and learn how to care for them!  

Let the learning begin!