Connecticut Volunteers Use Clams to Restore Eelgrass Meadows After 90% Decline

Eelgrass Meadows (Representative image) In the shallow waters of Long Island Sound, Connecticut volunteers are using an unlikely pair of helpers to bring back an underwater forest: live clams and eelgrass seeds. Researchers and community members are gluing seeds to clam shells, then releasing the clams at carefully chosen sites where they burrow into the seabed and effectively plant the seeds. The approach, known as Seeds of Eelgrass Attached to Shellfish (SEAS), has already produced encouraging early results, with drone imagery showing a 178 percent increase in eelgrass meadow coverage after the 2025 planting. The work matters because eelgrass meadows in and around Long Island Sound have declined by more than 90 percent since the 1980s, according to Save the Sound. These underwater grasslands shelter young fish and invertebrates, filter water, absorb excess nutrients, stabilise shorelines, and release oxygen. Restoring them is difficult, but the clam planting method may offer a practical, nature-based way to rebuild habitat that has all but disappeared. Read more about it here:Why eelgrass is worth savingEelgrass, or Zostera marina, is a flowering plant that grows entirely underwa...