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West Meadow Beach

Photo by James Palumbo

By Angela Palumbo

In January 2020, former President Donald Trump (R) signed an executive order that replaced the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers definition of what is considered a federal body of water under the Waters of the United States rule, known as WOTUS. 

In his election campaign, President Joe Biden (D) promised to undo these changes, which are currently under review. 

But what does all of this mean for Long Island?

Wetlands are areas where water covers the soil, or is present near the surface of the soil all year for varying periods of time. According to a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service report, as at 2004 6% of Long Island was made up of wetlands — that’s about 51,000 acres. 

Wetlands, due to their beneficial services to people and wildlife — including providing habitats to multiple species, improving water quality and assisting with flood protections —are among some of the most productive ecosystems in the world.

Photo by James Palumbo

Wetland protections can also create problems for business developers and farmers. One of Trump’s main reasons for passing his executive order in 2020 was to redefine the definitions of which bodies of water could be protected under WOTUS in order to remove legal roadblocks to farmers caused by the need to determine whether water on their land fell under control of the federal government.

“After decades of landowners relying on expensive attorneys to determine what water on their land may or may not fall under federal regulations, our new Navigable Waters Protection Rule strikes the proper balance between Washington and the states in managing land and water resources while protecting our nation’s navigable waters, and it does so within the authority Congress provided,” said EPA administrator, Andrew Wheeler, in a January 2020 news release.

Now, due to the undoing of restrictions by Trump’s administration, local conservationists are worried about the long-term effects on Long Island’s wetlands.

Coby Klein, a conservationist at the Huntington-Oyster Bay Audubon Society and adjunct professor of Natural Sciences at Baruch College, said that Long Island’s wetlands are beneficial to both the community and the organisms that dwell in them, and they need to be preserved.

“Wetlands provide protection from flooding, especially the coastal wetlands, the salt marshes and things like that,” he said. “They also help work to mitigate climate change. When plants die in these wetland areas, they don’t decompose very quickly. They serve as what’s called a carbon sink. Instead of carbon being put back into the atmosphere when a plant dies, it gets stored in the soil and in the muck in the water.”

Victoria O’Neill, Long Island Sound Study habitat restoration coordinator at the state Department of Environmental Conservation, is another local conservationist who confirms that healthy wetlands are important to Long Island.

“Tidal wetlands provide many different ecosystem services to Long Island communities,” she said. “They help provide protection from coastal storm surge, improve water quality, provide recreational enjoyment and serve as nesting, breeding and resting grounds for commercial and recreationally important fish and shellfish.”

With all of the benefits wetlands provide to Long Island communities and ecosystems, why did the federal government want to push back on protecting them? Klein said it is because, “they get in the way.”

“When there’s any type of pollution that gets into a body of water, it ends up in a wetland,” Klein said.  “That’s bad news for the things that grow there and live there. Salt marshes are very susceptible to nitrogen pollution, and that’s a big problem on Long Island because almost everybody around here fertilizes their lawns, and they tend to overfertilize.” 

He added that because of the high volume of sewage systems on Long Island, the excess fertilizer from people’s lawns and farmers’ fields tends to go from the sewage systems to large bodies of water and then eventually into rivers and wetlands. This causes excess nitrogen that is detrimental to those ecosystems.

Photo by James Palumbo

Under Trump’s redefinition of protected waters under WOTUS, it has become easier for developers and farmers to make those kinds of damages to wetlands but, according to the DEC, New York is taking great steps forward as a leader in the efforts to protect state wetlands and their invaluable natural habitat.

“It is estimated that the Navigable Waters Protection Rule will remove federal protections for about half the nation’s wetlands,” the state DEC said in a 2020 statement. “Thankfully, existing strong protections of waters in New York state will reduce the impact of the Navigable Waters Protection Rule compared to many other states. However, not all wetlands are protected under New York law and we rely on federal protection and our water quality certification review to protect smaller wetlands. Recent changes in the definition of Waters of the United States have resulted in fewer of these smaller wetlands receiving any regulatory protection.”

According to O’Neill, active steps are being taken to restore wetland habitats that have been lost.

“The tidal wetland ecosystem target in the LISS’s 2015 Comprehensive Conservation & Management Plan set a goal to restore 515 additional acres of tidal wetlands by 2035 from a 2014 baseline,” she said. “As of 2020, we are 15.5% toward our goal.”

Klein said that restoration projects are time sensitive and need to happen as soon as possible.

“Wetlands provide us with all kinds of important ecosystem services and even more important than that, they’re just pleasant places,” he said. “We should try to preserve them simply because there are so many creatures besides us that depend on them. So even if they didn’t do all this important stuff for us, we should still try to conserve them because they do important things for other species.”

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Photo by Michael Perlotto

A STATUESQUE SIGHT

Michael Perlotto of Stony Brook snapped this incredible photo in mid-March. He writes, ‘I was walking at dusk on Trustees Road [at West Meadow Beach]. I rounded the corner and came upon this amazing scene.  I was the only one within eyesight … you could hear a pin drop as the deer stood off on the horizon.  I quickly took this picture with my iPhone as the deer stood perfectly still like statues!’

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Long Island Coastal Steward President Denis Mellett shows growing shellfish at Brookhaven’s mariculture facility. File photo by Kyle Barr

Town of Brookhaven Supervisor Ed Romaine (R) announced Dec. 21 that the town was awarded a 2020 Long Island Sound Futures Fund matching grant to fund the town’s Coastal Environment and Community Resilience Education Program. The Town will match the $8,799 grant with $4,450, making the total conservation impact $13,249. The grant combines funds from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.

“The Long Island Sound is vital to the ecology and economy of Brookhaven town and it is our goal to preserve it for future generations,” Romaine said in a release. “Thanks to the Long Island Sound Futures Fund grant, we will continue to increase public awareness and encourage participation in our environmental protection efforts in the town.”    

Brookhaven’s year-long Coastal Environment and Community Resilience Education Program will run from Jan. 1, 2021 through Dec. 31, 2021. The goal is to foster conservation by bringing people to the Long Island Sound or by bringing the Long Island Sound to the people. The town’s environmental educator will conduct presentations paired with hands-on activities tailored for each audience at public libraries throughout the Town of Brookhaven. Presentations and tours will include detailed descriptions of the intricate balance of the coastal ecosystems, the wonderful flora and fauna on the shore, dunes and salt marsh, and the positive and negative impacts of human activity in these places. 

The program will also include informative, guided tours of Cedar Beach in Mount Sinai, including the town’s Marine Environmental Stewardship Center and shellfish and eel grass restoration projects. There will also be nature tours for people of all ages and hands-on conservation programs with the Junior Environmental Stewards at Mount Sinai Harbor and West Meadow Beach in Stony Brook. The series will create more sustainable and resilient communities by increasing knowledge and engagement of the public in the protection and restoration of the coastal environments of Long Island Sound. 

Photo by Dawn Olenick

SUNDAY’S SURPRISE

Dawn Olenick of Baiting Hollow visited West Meadow Beach in Stony Brook on the evening of Dec. 13 and captured this beautiful sunset. She writes, ‘Mother Nature put on a show … tide pools and all her splendor … we all watched in awe!’

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The West Meadow Beach parking lot might soon see parking meters as part of Brookhaven’s plans to recoup $2 million in annual revenue. Photo by Julianne Mosher

Amongst the hard decisions stemming from approving its 2021 budget during the pandemic-induced economic downturn, the Town of Brookhaven has included a somewhat controversial change to how it will process parking at several town beaches and marinas.

As an offset to pandemic induced losses, the town voted unanimously Thursday, Nov. 19, to no longer have seasonal employees sitting in booths at town beaches. Instead officials are opting for a meter system, though residents who pay for a town parking sticker will be able to park freely.

The 2021 town budget was also approved Nov. 19 without discussion from the board.  

The biggest increases to the $307 million budget are in the form of a $2.34 million general fund property tax increase. This is being offset slightly by highway taxes, leading to an annual tax increase of a little under $9 for the average homeowner. It also remains under the 1.56% New York State tax levy cap. Garbage pickup will be set at $1 a day for a single-family home, or $365 a year.

In addition to the 2021 budget, the board opted to amend the current year’s capital budget to the tune of $900,000 for the new parking system. The town voted to issue new bonds worth $1 million in total to pay to acquire and install the new parking meters.

Meters are expected to be placed at the Holtsville Park, Sandspit Marina in Patchogue, Port Jeff Marina, Corey Beach in Blue Point, West Meadow Beach and Shoreham Beach. Anyone with a parking sticker will not have to pay into the meters. The meters, which aesthetically appear like those in Port Jeff village, are going to be active between May 1 and Oct. 15.

The town is discussing a $25 parking sticker fee per vehicle with a reduced price for additional vehicles in the household. Reduced fees for seniors and veterans parking stickers will still be available.  

Supervisor Ed Romaine (R) said the town is paying millions of dollars for its part-time workers at these parks and beaches to monitor people coming in. Currently people without parking stickers pay $5 for the day at these beaches, but under the new system will only need to pay for the time spent at 50 cents an hour.

Officials said the new meters will work like they do in places like Port Jefferson, though the town did not discuss what the hourly rates will be. 

During the afternoon meeting, Councilwoman Valerie Cartright (D-Port Jefferson Station) called for discussion on the parking issue which created a few tense moments between the councilwoman and supervisor. Cartright said she was given very little time to present information about the parking system to her constituents, though she did receive some comments and questions from community members that did require some kind of presentation about the proposal.

“This discussion of having a parking meter system put in place has been a point of discussion over the past few years,” Cartright said. “Every time it’s been brought up, I’ve had my community members … [registering] objections to having parking meters there.”

Cartright did vote “yes” for the parking change, later citing in a letter to constituents that the added revenue from such a parking system will help the town as COVID has played havoc with its finances.

“It is our understanding from Parks Commissioner [Edward] Morris that this system will produce approximately $2 million in revenue annually,” Cartright wrote. “It is anticipated that there will be significant savings in eliminating the need for attendants to take payments and check stickers once this project is implemented. … Additionally, the potential health benefits of no longer exchanging cash for parking fees were also part of my consideration in light of the ongoing COVID pandemic.”

Herb Mones, the land-use chairman of the Three Village Civic Association, wrote a letter on behalf of the civic to Cartright and the Town Board arguing that it is the wrong time to start changing the parking system during a pandemic, especially when more people are seeking places like West Meadow Beach for some respite.

In a phone interview, Mones argued there had been effectively no public debate about the parking change and no notice, save for the letter Cartright sent to civic groups and constituents a few days before the Nov. 19 meeting. 

As a longtime resident and supporter of West Meadow Beach, he said that changing the parking system will affect the character of these parks and beaches. He added that staff manning the booths add a “ruralesque” charm to a public place, and that it also takes away the opportunity for the people at booths to screen incoming cars for things that might not be allowed at a beach or park, such as pets. 

“People in attendance at the beach have been a staple of the rural or suburban ideal,” he said. “The town doesn’t respect the right for easy public access to facilities that we have paid for over generations. … For someone like me, it makes me very weary when the town makes a proposal that impacts one of the services we’ve come to understand and love.”

Lifeguards at West Meadow Beach made a quick save of one of the North Shore's most beautiful local hawks. Photo from Town of Brookhaven

Lifeguards at West Meadow Beach recently proved their willingness to protect any living thing in distress.

Town of Brookhaven said in a release that lifeguards stationed at West Meadow Beach spotted a large bird in the water that appeared to be in distress. As the lifeguards approached, they realized the bird was not a waterfowl, as originally suspected, but a much larger Osprey that had become entangled in thick fishing line with a weighted sinker. The bird could not fly and was on the verge of drowning as it panicked to stay afloat in the water. 

Town lifeguards maneuvered a rescue surfboard underneath the bird, which allowed its head to remain above water and provide it with something firm to grasp. Brookhaven’s Environmental Educator, Nicole Pocchiare, was called to the scene to aid in the rescue and was able to get the bird into a box for transport to the Middle Island Save the Animals Foundation location with the help of lifeguards on duty. The veterinarian at STAR handled the large, taloned bird while clearing the wire, flushing the wound and checking for injuries. The bird was released back near his nest at West Meadow Beach after being cleared by the veterinarian. 

“I commend the lifeguards for their quick action to save this beautiful bird’s life,” said Brookhaven town Supervisor Ed Romaine (R). “Please remember not to leave fishing line, lures, or wire on the beach or in the water. Litter and debris pose a threat to the health and safety of wildlife and marine life that call our beaches home.”

Councilwoman Valerie Cartright (D-Port Jefferson Station) was also impressed by the lifeguards’ quick thinking.

“Thank you to the lifeguards who came to the rescue of this osprey,” Cartwright said. “I am impressed by their quick thinking and ingenuity. Osprey are a valued part of the West Meadow Beach ecosystem, and I appreciate that these lifeguards went above and beyond to save the life of this important species. I also want to extend my thanks to our Environmental Educator, Nicole Pocchiare, and those at STAR for playing a part in this rescue. I encourage everyone to use fishing line recovery receptacles to properly dispose of this material that can cause devastating consequences to our cherished wildlife.”

 

Town of Brookhaven's Cedar Beach. Photo by Kyle Barr

In response to the expected high temperatures Monday,  July 27,  and Tuesday, July 28, the Town of Brookhaven has extended the hours at Cedar Beach in Mount Sinai, West Meadow Beach in Stony Brook
and Corey Beach in Blue Point.  Lifeguards will be on duty and restrooms will be open until 7 p.m. on both days, instead of the normal 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekdays.

Davis Park and Great Gun Beaches will be open as normal from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The town’s Holtsville Pool will remain open as normal with two sessions daily from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and
2:30 pm to 6:30 pm. The pool is open for residents only. Online pre-registration and payment is required. Go to www.BrookhavenNY.gov/HoltsvillePool for more details. Social distancing is required and strictly enforced at the Holtsville Pool, town beaches and all town parks and recreation facilities.

A Brookhaven Town resident parking sticker is required for beach and pool parking. The sticker can only be
purchased online at www.BrookhavenNY.gov/Stickers. For more information, call 631-451-TOWN (8696) or visit www.BrookhavenNY.gov. Beaches are open to Brookhaven town residents only.

A piping plover at West Meadow Beach in Stony Brook on May 26. Photo by Jay Gao
Mother Nature’s Wrath

   By Ellen Mason, Stony Brook

Mother Nature is angry

And she’s showing her wrath. 

We’ve destroyed her best efforts,

Walking down this wrong path. 

 

Our health is at stake,

And the health of our earth. 

But we’ve not done enough 

To make up for this dearth. 

 

Water pollution,

Severe climate change,

Endangered species,

There’s a whole range

 

Of needed improvements

For what we have wrought.  

We’ve squandered our riches,

And look what we’ve bought!

 

Yes we’ll get through this,

She’s stern but not cruel. 

But we must pay attention

And live by new rules.

Two fiddler crabs battle it out at West Meadow Beach last year. Photo by Jay Gao

By John L. Turner

If you visit just about any salt marsh fringing Long Island’s interdigitated coastline, you’ll experience the fiddlers — they simply can’t be avoided. And while you won’t hear fiddle music, despite the fact there are many hundreds if not thousands of fiddler’s ceaselessly “rosining up their bows,” you will certainly be entertained and amused by male fiddler crabs waving their unusually large claws back and forth like a convention of fiddle players at a folk music festival.  

This prominent and highly distinctive abnormally large claw possessed by the male fiddler crab, which can weigh half as much as the rest of its body, isn’t used as a defense against predators. Rather, it’s used in combat with rival males and for attracting a mate; male crabs possessing larger claws generally having more success (yes, for this species size appears to matter!).  

A male fiddler crab. Photo by Jay Gao

As a female crab walks by a courting male, he vigorously waves the claw back and forth in an attempt to interest her in mating (this behavior also explains their other name — the calling crab). If his display proves successful, she follows him back to his burrow to take a closer look. If she accepts him, the male grabs material to seal the burrow and within it mates with her. He will later emerge, resealing the burrow within which she is incubating the eggs. In a week or two she’ll emerge to release her eggs, generally timing release to coincide with a high tide. They hatch and the larvae float in the water column before eventually settling out; this dispersal helps to maintain genetic diversity among crab populations.   

Three species of fiddler crabs inhabit Long Island’s coastal environments: the mud fiddler (Minuca pugnax) appears to be the most common, followed by the sand fiddler (Leptuca pugilator) with the red-jointed or brackish-water fiddler (Minuca minax) being the least common. They segregate habitat as their names suggest — mud fiddlers found in the mud-rich, organic areas of salt marshes, sand fiddlers utilizing sandy areas, and the red-jointed fiddlers occurring in areas where waters are more brackish, containing lower salt content. They can be a bit of a challenge to identify but with some practice it can be done. 

Worldwide, 105 species of fiddler crabs are currently recognized. They are found along the coastlines of every continent, thus having a global distribution, specifically occurring along the coastlines of southern Asia, Africa (especially the east coast), northern Australia, both coasts of Central America, South America and the southern half of North America. They are distributed within a band of about 40 degrees north and south of the equator; our fiddler populations are among the farthest from the equator, being able to occur this far north due to the provisioning warmth of the Gulf Stream current. The colder waters bathing the coast of Europe preclude their presence there. 

Fiddler crabs at Flax Pond. Photo by John Turner

One of my favorite places to observe fiddler crabs in the Three Village area is Flax Pond, the wonderful natural area owned by New York State (hence you!) located in Old Field, in the northwestern corner of Brookhaven Town. A newly reconstructed boardwalk bisects the marsh, passing over a tidal marsh and stream. About 100 yards north of its beginning the boardwalk offers an ideal vantage point to view these intertidal crabs feeding below in the salt marsh, the boardwalk itself effectively serving as a blind.  

If you time the tides right (low tide or falling tide is best), many hundreds of fiddlers will dot the marsh surface — many courting, waving their big claw to and fro while many more take advantage of the exposed mud to feed. If you stroll along one edge of the boardwalk where the crabs can see you, the marsh will appear in motion from the action of countless crabs moving away from you. Other local productive sites include West Meadow Creek and Stony Brook Harbor.  

The fiddler’s burrow, as much as 2 feet long, is critical to a crab’s survival. Here it finds protection from predators and shelter from the high tides which twice daily inundate the burrow (they’re safe in their plugged, air-filled chamber). Even if water enters, they can survive since fiddler crabs have both gills allowing them to breathe in water and a primitive lung which allows them to breathe when feeding in the air on the marsh surface. Studies document their burrow is the “hub of the wheel” from which they never move too far. 

One study, by an Australian researcher, documented that crabs tend to orient themselves to their burrow, not by facing it or having their back to it, but rather sideways with one half of their set of four legs facing the burrow in the event they have to rapidly scurry sideways to gain protection from a predator.   

If you pay closer attention to the crabs’ enlarged claws, you’ll notice that they’re about evenly split between left-handed and right-handed individuals, with some populations having slightly more of one or the other. If the large claw is lost to a predator or in battle, the smaller claw enlarges to become the “fiddler” claw while the regenerated claw remains small, becoming the feeding claw.     

Watching crabs feed is fun; the females with two normal size claws feed more efficiently than do the males who can utilize but one claw, since the larger one is useless as a feeding tool. Recently, I watched several females feeding and they brought food to their mouths about once a second for minutes on end. Fiddlers feed on decaying vegetation, bacteria, algae and other organic matter found in the sand or mud, efficiently sifting out with their mouthparts the sand particles which they cast aside in the form of little balls or pellets.     

A Yellow-crowned Night Heron snacks on a fiddler crab. Photo by Luke Ormand

Their distinctive stalked eyes provide an alien, other-world look to the species. They have compound eyes, like dragonflies, with up to 9,000 eye facets that can see into the ultraviolet range of the light spectrum! Being on stalks allows them to have slightly elevated, panoramic vision of the marsh around them, a good thing since they face numerous predators that frequent tidal wetlands. The visual sensors on top of their eyes enable them to see motion from overhead, a key adaptation since they are subject to predation by birds. 

Speaking of birds, several species routinely eat fiddlers. American bittern and clapper rails feed on them as do a variety of wading birds such as white and glossy ibis and American egret; yellow-crowned night herons, whose diet is largely restricted to crabs, especially focus on fiddler crabs. Diamondback terrapins eat them as do river otters. 

 Being a key part of the estuarine or coastal food chain is one of the important ecological benefits fiddlers provide; they also play a key role in recycling marsh nutrients through their feeding activities. Their burrows, which collectively can number in the many thousands in a large marsh, help to oxygenate the soil, helping marsh plants to grow such as cordgrass and salt hay. Their presence is also a “bio-indicator” — a general indication of a salt marsh’s high ecological health, generally occurring in tidal wetlands free of pollution and contamination.

Why not make their acquaintance before they retreat deeply into muddy burrows for their long winter slumber?

A resident of Setauket, John Turner is conservation chair of the Four Harbors Audubon Society, author of “Exploring the Other Island: A Seasonal Nature Guide to Long Island” and president of Alula Birding & Natural History Tours.

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Artifacts gathered at the Fischetti Site along West Meadow Creek. Photo from Beverly C. Tyler

By Beverly C. Tyler

Long Island, Brookhaven Town and the Three Village area have a rich history, with a population dating back thousands of years before the first white settlers. The first humans to set foot on Long Island were of the Paleo-Indian and Archaic cultures. These hunter-gatherers came to Long Island between 12,500 and 3,000 years ago. The first cultural group, the Paleo-Indians (12,500 to 8,000 BP, before present, defined as 1950) hunted the mammoths and mastodons with spear points called Clovis points. Several Clovis points have been found on Long Island.

Artifact gathered at the Fischetti Site along West Meadow Creek. Photo from Beverly C. Tyler

Long Island Native Americans of the Algonquian culture settled in Brookhaven and used the land and the sea to provide all of their needs. These early settlers (3,000 to 1,000 BP, the Woodland culture period) used the rich coastal resources to support their native family groups.

There were basically two family groups of Native Americans in Brookhaven during the Woodland period. The Setalcotts, a name meaning “land on the mouth of the creek,” on the north near Long Island Sound, and the Unkechauges on the south shore near the Great South Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. They were described as tall and muscular with straight hair and a reddish complexion. They lived in simple lodge dwellings. They hunted in the plentiful forests, fished in the well-stocked bays and streams and grew corn and a few vegetables in small farming plots.

In the 1500s, the first European traders and trappers traveled up and down the east coast of North America. They bought food and furs from the Native Americans in exchange for iron goods, cloth goods and trinkets. Gradually the Native American way of life began to change. At the same time, with no resistance to European diseases, the Native Americans were devastated by smallpox and other diseases. The native population decreased by more than 50 percent, leaving fertile lands open to settlement by people of English descent from New England, eastern Long Island and England. In 1609, Henry Hudson landed on Long Island, before beginning his exploration of the Hudson River. He described the Indians as “seeming very glad of our coming and brought greene tobacco and gave us of it for knives and beads.”

From the time of Native American hunter-gatherers through Colonial times, West Meadow Beach, West Meadow Creek and the adjacent tidal wetlands have been a valuable resource. Archaeological excavations have given us most of the details of how people lived in this area as early as 5,000 years ago. One of the most famous sites in New York State was a nearby shell midden named the Stony Brook Site, excavated by the state archaeologist William Richie in 1955.

From archaeological digs by Richie and others, we know that, between 5,000 and 3,000 years ago, the native people were hunters and gatherers, dependent upon hunting local animals and gathering plants, stones and clay for food, shelter, tools, clothes and medicines.

Aunt Amy’s Creek at West Meadow Creek, site of an early Native American village and an archaeological exploration by New York State Archaeologist William Richie. Vance Locke Mural

The Fischetti Site, a prehistoric Indian site for manufacturing tools and spear points, was discovered during a cultural resource investigation of a proposed residential development in November of 1980. Salvage excavations continued through October of 1981.

The site, on the east side of West Meadow Creek opposite the horse show grounds and the new walking trail, was occupied by Algonquin Indians about 3,000 years ago. We know they used this location then because of the type of arrow and spear points and blades recovered. The primary activity here, on the edge of Stony Brook Creek, was making stone tools. We know this by the vast quantities of stone flakes and roughed-out stones.

The almost total absence of food remains at the site shows that this was not the location of a village. However, a village site, the Stony Brook Site, did exist about 800 yards to the south, along what is now known as Aunt Amy’s Creek, during the same time period.

For thousands of years, the Indians used natural resources, wood, stone and animals to make their housing, tools and clothing. About 3,000 years ago, their way of life changed with the introduction of three things: pottery, the bow and arrow and horticulture (farming). Like the earlier Indians, the Woodland Indians continued to rely on natural resources.

The artifacts taken from the Fischetti Site are part of the collection of the Three Village Historical Society. Artifacts from the Richie site are a part of the collection of the New York State Museum.

Beverly C. Tyler is Three Village Historical Society historian and author of books available from the society at 93 North Country Road, Setauket. For more information, call 631-751-3730 or visit www.tvhs.org.