The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
A new guide to L.I. Sound reminds us what is near and dear
If you step into the New Haven Free Public Library and head downstairs, you will be drawn to Patrick J. Lynch’s colorful paintings of an Eastern Screech Owl, an Osprey, a Harlequin Duck, a Belted Kingfisher, a Snowy Owl and a Peregrine Falcon, among other attractions.
Most of this artwork is contained in Lynch’s “A Field Guide to Long Island Sound” (Yale University Press), a lavishly illustrated volume that also tells of the Sound’s rich history and examines our environmental challenges and responsibilities to safeguard this unique body of water.
It’s fitting that Lynch’s exhibit is at this library (until Dec. 2) because that’s where this endeavor essentially began many years ago when he was a teenager.
“I know almost to the day when I decided to become an artist and it was at the New Haven Free Public Library,” he wrote in an introductory message posted at the exhibit.
“I was between my junior and senior year at Hillhouse High School and I did not have a job that summer,” he recalled. “On a sunny, hot July afternoon in 1970 I was wandering the stacks of the library and discovered the art section, the books on how to draw and paint. I found a book on pencil drawing and was fascinated by the complex and skillful illustrations. I decided then and there that I would put serious effort into learning to draw.”
Lynch concluded with a thought that must gladden the hearts of the library’s staff: “Never underestimate the power of a library to open up new worlds to a young mind.”
When I met Lynch last Tuesday night at a reception marking the exhibit’s opening, he reminisced about that fateful summer’s day. “I was just drifting around the library, looking for things to read. When I saw that book, I thought: ‘Oh! I want to learn how to do this.’ I had no money but I figured I could afford a pencil and paper.”
In addition to being attracted to drawing, the young Lynch was keenly interested in birds, natural history and marine biology. Many years later, when he retired from his job as a senior digital officer at Yale University’s Office of Public Affairs and Communications, he had more time to devote to researching and writing his Long Island Sound field guide.
Lynch noted he led a bird walk last weekend at his favorite site on the Sound, Hammonasset Beach State Park in Madison. “It’s the crown jewel of the Sound,” he said. “The diversity of the habitat, the gorgeous marshes and a spectacular location for birds.”
His book has a chapter highlighting nine key sites on the Sound in Connecticut. In addition to Hammonasset, they are: Sherwood Island State Park in Westport, Milford Point, the Sandy Point Bird Sanctuary in West Haven, Lighthouse Point in New Haven, Chaffinch Island Park in Guilford, Rocky Neck State Park in East Lyme, Bluff Point State Park in Groton and the Barn Island Wildlife Management Area in Stonington. His detailed descriptions of each place will encourage readers to go and visit them.
But Lynch’s page on Chaffinch Island Park reminds us the Sound is facing significant environmental problems. He wrote that the island “shows the classic damage signs of sea level rise . ... The marsh is rapidly eroding and the beach is actually storm-driven sand that has been pushed up and over the old high marsh.” He noted that about one-third of the island’s salt marsh has vanished in just the past 80 years.
And yet as he wrote in his book, the Sound’s ecological situation is “not hopeless.” He added, “The overall biological productivity of the Sound as a whole has remained constant over the past 20 years, in spite of many environmental challenges.”
During our interview, Lynch said, “Long Island Sound is doing pretty well. It has challenges, especially on the western (New York) end.” He cited run-off from sewage systems, which is also a problem in Connecticut. In addition, he noted the problem of run-off from fertilizer and pesticides used on lawns.
“My wife and I use minimal fertilizer treatment on our lawn and no pesticides,” he said. “We’re acutely aware of what we put on our lawn. Eventually all of that stuff runs into rivers and streams that end up in the Sound.”
Lynch also advises property owners to “focus drainage from your roof and driveway into a natural area, a bushy place that can absorb it.”
Lynch is pleased to see older
towns and cities along the Sound, especially in New York, slowly but steadily upgrading their sewer systems. He said the federal Clean Water Act, along with local and state regulations have pushed reluctant municipal officials into curtailing their run-off.
As a result of some improvement in the Sound’s overall health, Lynch said, “We’ve been seeing more seals and dolphins in the past few years. Even a few humpback whales!”
But parts of Lynch’s book caution us about getting smug or complacent about the state of the Sound. In his preface, he wrote: “The accelerating rate of climate change in the past 50 years has altered both our shorelines and the life around Long Island Sound. Our lobster fishery ended 20 years ago because the Sound is now too warm for the Northern Lobster.” (Lynch said only about 20 commercial lobster fishers remain in Connecticut.)
He also noted in his preface, “Many formerly abundant food fish like the Atlantic Cod have become scarce due to overfishing.” Lynch said the rising waters of the Sound are shrinking the habitats of birds such as the Piping Plover and threatening the salt marsh meadows that are the breeding grounds for the Saltmarsh Sparrow and other endangered species.
Lynch quoted scientists “who point to the earth’s radically increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide as evidence that human activities are now the most important drivers of climate change.”
Then Lynch wrote this disturbing warning: “The warming of both the atmosphere and the ocean will profoundly affect all shoreline communities and habitats, bringing changes in the frequency and severity of storms, altering the species mix of local wildlife, and literally changing the shoreline itself as the rise in sea level accelerates.”
Lynch’s chapter on how humans have affected the Sound has this conclusion: “Long Island Sound is a beautiful place, appreciated by millions of people every year, and is certainly worth the price of keeping it healthy and attractive.”
Lynch pointed out during our interview that property along the Sound remains “so desirable that the prices are some of the most expensive for real estate in the country.”
Lynch, whose home is in North Haven, said wistfully that he has always wanted to live near the Sound but those prices have made it impossible. He tried to put an upbeat spin on it: “I’m only about 11 miles away as the crow flies.”