Nutz4Nature

Riverside park is a spectacular water front park along the Hudson River on NYC’s Upper West side, lined with malls and winding walkways and car-free bike paths.

Much of this park consists of rolling hills and massive rocks carved by glaciers around which there are playgrounds, recreational areas dog parks and plenty of room to lay or play. Urban green spaces like these allow people to be around nature while still being in the city. They promote physical activity and relief of stress by providing spaces for relaxation and a tranquil escape from New York’s bustling streets.

Mediums or islands of mowed turf grass throughout the length of the concrete mall in the center of the paved walkways help connect the two green spaces. This makes it more likely for organisms to travel between them, increasing their habitat, and helps to maximize services the parks provide. The more green the better!

Turf in urban green spaces offers regulating services of absorbing rainfall and reducing water runoff, stabilizing soil and nutrients, purifying air and water, and even temperature control and lowering noise pollution.

As you walk the length of the mall you will come across enclosed gardens like these filled with a variety of ornamental plants and flowers that encourage pollination and beautify the walkway during warmer months

More islands of green! The scenic waterfront walkway. A beautiful spot to jog, bike, take a stroll or watch the sunset over New Jersey across the Hudson River.

Calvert Vaux Park also hosts a diverse population of plants and flora. Click ‘more’ to look through the catalog. (more…)

The Coney Island Creek that rests on Calvert Vaux Park is home to a variety of birds. For one is the Yellow-rumped Warbler. They are the most common kind of warbler.

Birds fly over rocks on the edge of Coney Island Creek.

There are also plenty of ducks that like to hang out along the creek.

At other times you can find egrets and swans too.

The egret is a native bird that feeds along the shoreline and in the shallows, stirring up mud with their feet to find fish and crabs. A century ago, egrets were an endangered species, nearly hunted into extinction for their feathers, which were used as hat decorations. They are now federally protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Another large bird on the creek is the Mute Swan, a non-native species. And word of caution, if you’re going to the park after dark, be sure to look out for bats!

The salt marsh on the creek provides a nursery habitat and feeding ground for birds.

Before development began in the 1820s, Coney Island was desolate barrier island bordering a vast salt marsh that stretched north to what is now 86th Street. Some decades later, the city laid out 85 acres of landfill near this salt marsh, and formed a creek. Calvert Vaux Park was built on this landfill, and is now the home to a variety of environments, including a restored salt marsh, mudflats, and upland habitat, that support a surprising array of wildlife and native plants.

Map View of Calvert Vaux Park

Coney Island Creek flowed through this thousand-acre wetland consisting mostly of a plant marsh known as spartina. Spartina lines the border of the park, and can be even seen growing in shipwrecks.

‘

Two species of spartina are the building blocks of complex ecosystems that provide food and shelter for a variety of wildlife.

In the bottom right hand corner you can see mudflats. These mudflats are part of the reason that this creek can support its salt marsh ecosystem. Mudflats also help in preventing coastal erosion. And every year, they are used by migratory birds as place to crash while migrating to the southern hemisphere.

The spartina found along the creek’s banks was planted as part of a salt marsh restoration.

Stuyvesant Park – Lower East Side, NYC

Though it is a small and humble park in comparison with ones like Central Park, Stuyvesant Park is home to a bevy of ecosystem services.  As depicted here, it sets the stage for both recreational cultural services and regulating services like air purification and carbon sequestration (when the trees intake and make use of the carbon in the environment).  Without the trees’ performance as “resuscitators” of life, so to speak, all oxygen-breathing life would suffocate.

Central Park – Near Olmsted Flower Bed

Central Park’s value as a place for ecotourism is underestimated – indeed, the very vehicles for this ecosystem service is made of another, trees!  Within the park is a rustic wooden gazebo overlooking the terrain.  This serves as a quaint destination for visitors, thus boosting the local economy (Street vendors!  Bodega owners!  Cab drivers, etc.!), and provides natives with a vantage point to overlook nature in all its serenity.  In this way, this clearing and gazebo is a cultural ecosystem service.

Central Park – near 66th street transverse

Central Park is budding with flowers, though this ecosystem’s MVP is much more difficult to spy this time of year.  In the summer, bees would be buzzing around this flowery domain, moving from bud to bud in a quest for pollen and nectar.  In the process, they partake in a service called pollination.  If we didn’t have their help, New York City would much a much less vibrant, barren place.

New York’s Harbor, including the body of water pictured here, used to be the oyster capital of the world!

Looking North at Financial District and Battery Park on the Left from the Governor’s Island Ferry

Governor’s Island, home to the New York Harbor School and Billion Oyster Project headquarters.

Oyster beds were once abundant in the Hudson River Estuary but have been functionally extinct since the early 1900s due to over-harvesting and pollution. Oyster beds offer vital ecosystems by filtering water, providing habitat for other marine organisms (mud crabs, fish, mollusks and more) and protecting our shoreline by weakening strong waves before they reach land. Oysters are crucial to our harbor’s biodiversity and stability.

A batch of oysters from cages off the shore of Governor’s island. They are about to be rinsed and tagged based on the date of when they were sourced, their origins and when they were put into the cages. This way students can check the progress of their growth.

The Billion  Oyster Project (BOP) hopes to restore New York Harbor’s oyster beds with the help of volunteers and school children. To learn more about these efforts check out: https://www.billionoysterproject.org/

Besides and beneath these docks are oyster nurseries cared for by Harbor School students, teachers, BOP workers and volunteers.

Marine Park Nature Center Building

One might have thought that Prospect park would hold the title of Brooklyn’s largest park. However, Marine Park is surprisingly Brooklyn’s largest park as it features 530 acres of salt marsh precious grassland, home to a multitude of birds and native flora and fauna.

Salt marshes play a critical role in the support of human life, acting as natural filtration systems by trapping pollutants that would otherwise contaminate our bays and oceans. Salt marshes have the ability to absorb fertilizers, improve water quality, and reduce erosion. They are also among the richest wildlife habitats.

One Goose can be seen bathing in the left, far away from it’s flock, which can be seen in the distance of the same photo. Another flock of geese can be seen in the bottom right photo.

“The role of the salt marsh is even more crucial because more than 75 percent of the original salt marsh in Jamaica Bay has been destroyed. Most of that destruction was due to filling of marshes to create more land area for homes and industry. Marine Park’s salt marsh, formerly a wasteland filled with trash and abandoned cars, has been restored to its natural condition — proof that a rare and fragile ecosystem can safely exist even when it borders a heavily urban area like Brooklyn.”

Above, Algae can be seen growing on the edge of the lake. Healthy lakes need algae. Algae are important to the productivity of a lake or water body. Algae are primary producers. They use sunlight (through photosynthesis) to produce carbohydrates and are eaten by grazers such as protozoa and zooplankton (little animals like water fleas and rotifers). The zooplankton are, in turn, grazed upon by fish, which are eaten by bigger fish, and on up the food chain.

The Marine Park Nature Center is also home to a wide array of flowers, trees and bush. These paths and walking areas can beneficial to humans for it’s beauty and health benefits, while they also are home to insects, and small creatures.

The Nature Center Labels its plants for easy identification of its species!

Parks provides us with a simple way to improve emotional health – flowers. “The presence of flowers triggers happy emotions, heightens feelings of life satisfaction and affects social behavior in a positive manner.” – aboutflowers.com

As you may know, flowers are essential for the survival of bees and other insects who find home within the flowers and shrubs which otherwise wouldn’t be available without the parks in NYC! The pictures above portray species of flowers and shrubs such as “Black Chokeberry”, “Witch Alder” and “Blue Star”.

Sources: 

http://www.saltmarshalliance.org/smnc.html

http://www.aboutflowers.com/health-benefits-a-research.html

Battery Park is a 25-acre public park located at the southern tip of Manhattan, NYC. The area and park are named for the artillery batteries that were positioned there in the city’s early years to protect the settlement behind them.

The park features 32 species of trees ranging from the “blue atlas cedar” to the “Winter King”.  Trees in New York City removed an estimated 1,821 metric tons of air pollution in 1994. Parks such as the Battery in NYC parks have proven to be a key factor in the economic and ecological success of communities and are necessary throughout every major city, small town, and neighborhood of the world.

The images below display the species of trees named Willow oak, Peach oak, Pin Oak (Quercus palustris) and the London Plane (Platanus x acerifolia). I was able to capture these images during the Autumn months, portraying a riveting color scheme which everyone can enjoy!

Parks have proven that real estate value will increase with the amount of greenery and parks found in the area. A clear example to this would be the expensive real estate value found in the area overlooking Central Park, even further proved by the 20 locations found to have higher real estate values as parks were introduced to the area.(Crompton Study)

One of those areas is what you’re currently scrolling through; The Battery!

Source of statistics: http://www.eastshorepark.org/benefits_of_parks%20tpl.pdf