Spreading Seeds of Love
Coastal Habitat Restoration
Cornell Cooperative Extension Marine Program has been working to restore coastal habitats for over 25 years. This work is very important to ensure that coastal habitats continue to support our wildlife and protect our shorelines from erosion. For more information on our Habitat Restoration Program please visit, https://www.backtothebays.org/habitat-fund
Our habitat restoration efforts focus on marine meadows, salt marshes, and dune grass habitats. We typically work with three species of habitat forming plants: eelgrass Zostera marina, marsh grass Sporobolus alterniflorus, and dune grass Ammophila breviligulata. Within the dune and upland, coastal flowers and shrubs also play a key role for our pollinating insects and migrating birds. Ensuring these habitats are diverse with the native plants that our wildlife depends on is part of our mission as well. This is where Sead Bombs come in!
These SEAd Bomb Kits are a great and easy way to get the community involved in habitat restoration not only at the vulnerable shorelines but at their homes, places of works, parks with the bonus of attracting beautiful and beneficial pollinators, like monarch butterflies.
We have developed two versions of our SEAd Bomb Kits.
The Spring/Summer SEAd Bombs have many native perennial, native little bluestem grass, and a variety of annual seeds in the mix. The perennial (come back every year) native plants that grow from the seed bombs are not only attractive to pollinators as food and habitat sources but they have large strong root systems helping prevent erosion. The annual plants (need to be planted yearly) that will grow in the spring/summer SEAd Bombs provide lots of important nectar for successive monarch generations and all of the other pollinators. And these plants will provide seeds for birds to eat! Some of the varieties of seeds in the mix are Purple Coneflower, New England Aster, Black Eyed Susan, Common Milkweed, Coreopsis, Poppies, 4 O’Clocks, Indian Blanket Flower, Cosmos. The spring/summer version needs to be created and thrown between the beginning of May & the 4th of July.
Adding Color & Nectar to Coastal Habitat Restoration
Over the last few years, CCE Marine has been expanding the varieties of coastal habitat plants we are working with. We started a small nursery of native coastal flowers and shrubbery (seaside goldenrod, beach plum, sand cherry, bayberry, eastern red cedar) to start mingling into our coastal restoration plantings.
Being that we are already immersed into coastal habitat restoration, and are currently working to expand our coastal plant nurseries at our Southold an Hampton Bays facilities, we figured why not help out some important friends and add some color and nectar to our plantings while doing so! Thanks to Southampton Town CPF and NFWF support, and in order to increase our efforts of coastal habitat restoration and community education, we developed a SEAd Bomb Kit.
The Fall/Winter SEAd Bombs have Common Milkweed, Butterfly Weed, and Little Bluestem Grass. Milkweed is is provided in both versions of the kit, it is vital to the survival of the monarch butterfly. Monarch butterflies lay there eggs only on the Asclepias (milkweed) genius of plants. Through out North America there are about 9 different varieties that they will lay there eggs on but seem to prefer the common milkweed Asclepias syriaca. The fall/winter version should be thrown/planted outside between the beginning of December & the end of March to allow for stratification.
In the Flyway Zone - Plight of the Endangered Monarch
“On December 15, 2020, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that listing the monarch as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act is warranted, but precluded by higher priority listing actions. The decision is the result of an extensive status review of the monarch that compiled and assessed the monarch’s current and future status. The monarch is now a candidate under the Endangered Species Act; we will review its status annually until a listing decision is made.” - US Fish & Wildlife Service Form more information on the status of monarch butterflies please visit www.fws.gov/savethemonarch/ssa.html
In June, the east end of Long Island starts to see monarch butterflies arriving from the south. Eastern Long Island is in the eastern flyway for monarch butterflies. Around Long Island the monarchs that arrive in June are the 3rd generation of butterflies that left Mexico in February or March. The 1st generation is the generation that is born somewhere in Texas. Their parents (4th generation or the migrating generation) wintered over in Mexico, took flight in February/March, mated and laid eggs on milkweed somewhere in Texas.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monarch_butterfly_migration
The eggs that hatch into caterpillars in Texas are the 1st generation of the yearly cycle. Once the eggs hatch, the larvae start feeding on the milkweed plant. The monarch caterpillar or larvae are specialist eaters, only eating various forms of milkweed to get them to the next stage of their development. The very hungry monarch caterpillar will remain a munching machine for 7 to 17 days before it turns into a chrysalis. It will remain in the chrysalis for 8 to 15 days before emerging as a beautiful butterfly.
Once emerged, the butterflies fuel up and start moving north. All adult monarch butterflies are generalist feeders ,feeding on nectar not only from milkweed but a wide variety of flowers which helps them maintain their energy for their long journeys. They will fly north to their spring breeding grounds somewhere in the mid eastern and central United States to mate and lay eggs along in milkweed creating the 2nd generation. Once the 2nd generation finishes it’s metamorphosis they fly north to milkweed patches to lay the 3rd generation.
Long Island hosts the 3rd generation monarch butterflies from June until August. Once the 3rd generation becomes butterflies they fly north to southern Canada to create the 4th generation. The 4th generation also will fuel up, diapause , and will take flight to Mexico to over 2500 miles away. This 4th generation is called the migrating generation and the three previous generations are called the successive generations. The migrating generation gets its name due to it being the generation of butterflies that will migrate over 2500 miles from Canada to Mexico for overwintering. This journey for the 4th generation typically starts in late September early October. Once in Mexico, Monarchs hibernate for the winter, awakening late February or March, becoming sexually mature, mating, and moving north within the first few days from awakening from their winter slumber .
Goals
In conjunction to the habitat restoration work we are doing at Tiana Bayside and SCLEMC (made possible by Southampton Town CPF and NFWF) we are working towards creating waystations at at our restoration and nursery sites. Waystations will provide habitat along with food and water for many pollinating insects and birds. The habitat will provide host plants for monarch caterpillars and nectar supplying energy for successive generations of monarch butterflies and the migratory generation of monarch butterflies.
A sustainable and reliable food and habitat source is crucial for one of the worlds most cherished pollinators, the monarch butterfly. Human induced habitat destruction and climate change have taken a toll on the milkweed family of plants and our coastal habitats.
You, YES YOU!! There are multiple ways in which you can make a difference in coastal habitats and the work we do. We will be hosting several habitat restoration workshops and we need all the help we can get splitting up and planting coastal plants for propagation, creating seed bombs and pulling weeds! If you are not the hands on type or there is too much distance between us we are always excepting of monetary donations!
And then there is the chance to support our work, support the precious monarch population and other pollinators by purchasing SEAd Bomb Kits for everyone you would be elated to give a gift of giving to!
The fall/winter SEAd Bomb kits make great holiday, host, house warming, and birthday gift… this may sound silly or absurd but they make a great gift for grief…. what a better way to brighten spirits with the ingredients to create a beautiful array of flowers that will not only make you smile but they will be helping out beautiful, precious, and super important pollinators.