North Oyster Bay Baymen's Association

03/25/2026

02/22/2026

Tributyltin levels at the Western Long Island Sound Dredge Spoil Dump Site were absolutely enough to suppress lobster immunity and reproduction. The same dumping was going on at the Central Long Island Sound Dredge Spoil Dump Site. Toxic marina sediments dumped directly in the primary habitat of Long Island Sound's Lobster Fishery. DEC and the Army Corps damned well knew it.

02/21/2026

The last image of Rachel Carson an American Hero who wrote "Silent Spring," Rachel wouldn't let go fighting DDT she was dismissed as a kook by all the companies and the government that went into coverup mode. Bald Eagles were nearly extinct Cormorants from one single chemical DDT: DDT is an Endocrine Disruptor TBT is an Endocrine Disruptor.

TBT Paint was Marine DDT and caused Silent Spring for our bays.

Every time they checked they found TBT in marina sediments at levels up to 100 times greater than those known to impair invertebrate reproduction. Imposex is where female snails develop pen*ses the snails eat on the bottom they eat bivalves bivalves live in the bottom. As bivalves filter water they also take in small amount of sediment because there is a nearly constant layer of floating sediment (sediment flux). Any where near a marina shellfish are likely to be exposed to TBT from sediment resuspension which can be a simple as boats moving in and out of the marina at low tide. Adult shellfish exposed while their go**ds are developing are likely to produce off spring that will have impaired reproductive development.

For decades over fishing by baymen has been used to explain the decline in coastal shellfish populations when there was another painfully obvious more plausible explanation.

The painful thing is DEC, the Army Corps, and EPA could and should have acted earlier but they went dark and covered all this up with little bandaids. TBT is still buried in anoxic marina sediments and still being spread around like it doesn't matter. All around the world they test for TBT in marina sediments before issuing an permits not in the United States here we don't even test for THE MOST TOXIC SUBSTANCE WE EVER INTRODUCED to the marine environment.

They dump it in the water they put it on our beaches they poison the ocean with it still. Every time DEC and the New York District issue a permit to dredge a marine with out core samples for the presence of TBT and its breakdown product they a knowingly committing an environmental crime and inhibiting the recovery of the shellfish industry.

Don't believe me? Just search Tributyltin in the marine environment and you find s**t nothing for research in the US while from China, Europe, and the UK. Why? Because the Army Corps and EPA shut down the research funding that would show them to be negligent.

02/21/2026

By 1981 DEC and the Army Corps knewTBT Bottom Paint was killing inshore shellfish reproduction worldwide! TBT is the marine DDT!

12/28/2025

This is one of Dwight Relyea's dredges in 2017. The sediment resuspended by this destroyed productivity in Oyster Bay by suffocating clam larvae year after year on public land.

We present the case to regulators at NYS State DEC and the Army Corp in 2017 proving that Dwight had been running without required federal permits since 2007. The Army Corps and DEC went into ass covering mode. These regulators went along with the lies on Dwight's applications. Newsday refused to tell the story and Friends of the Bay covered for Dwight the dredging continued full on until the last day of the lease in September 2024.

Dwight lied and it was obvious he claim the dredges water jets penetrated only up to about 3.5 inches (7-cm) and Stony Brook proved they penetrated 30-cm or about 10-inches.

In terms of regulatory requirements and the Clean Water Act the calculation below made by Debra Barnes the head of the the NYS Bureau of Shellfisheries who protected Dwight's dredging in Mill Neck Creek is a smoking gun. Barnes the head of defended in court papers the ripping out of a significant natural hard clam bed on 60-acres in Mill Neck Creek (MNC). MNC was loaded with wild littlenecks, cherrystones, and chowders. Being in a permanently closed area was the best type of spawner sanctuary possible.

Now Friends of the Bay who backed Flower's dredging for decades gets money from the town and other grant money to create sanctuaries that everybody knows are in the wrong place. what works as sanctuaries is wild natural shellfish in closed waters. Oysters just die because of diseases introduced by aquaculture.

12/25/2025

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/17Z2HwLVmF/

This is great victory for the ocean! Most commercial fishermen in New York started out as independent baymen and many still harvest shellfish.

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12/25/2025

Merry Christmas!! Wild Long Island Clams.

12/23/2025

Most fishermen around Long Island oppose offshore wind because of its negative effects on fishing access. Citizens Campaign for the Environment (CCE) is a political Non Governmental Organization (NGO) all we seem to ever see is photo opps with politicians glad handing and patting each other on the back.

As you can see the death of subsidized international offshore wind which most believe is better for the environment is seen as a bad thing negative for CCE.

The story of the horseshoe crab will be told in time. Generally though the data on horseshoe crab populations come not from a dedicated long term horseshoe crab population survey but from long term trawl survey designed to gauge finfish population. So while the data might be relevant it not designed to access horseshoe crab movement as they relate to the moon and tides or even sunlight.

These NGOs run around screaming that the horseshoe crab is functionally extinct in Long Island while fishermen still get their quotas with the same effort year after year. Then when it's obvious that the trawl survey is showing an increase they shift and say we will do community base beach assessment of spawning horseshoe crabs ourselves.

On such BS they ruin men's lives and fundraise to pay the salaries of the executive directors of these organizations.

There is a huge depression of invertebrate populations in inner harbor areas directly related to the use of Tributyltin antifouling paints. The paints were extensively used around Long Island from the 197Os until about 20O4. This is legacy contamination that destroys invertebrate reproduction and magnifies up the food chain. Horseshoe crabs eat the bugs in the bottom juvenile horseshoe crabs are born into this shallow water inshore environment literally chowing on infaunal invertebrate. It is well documented that TBT impacts juveniles the most disrupting reproductive development. TBT has a long life in soft anoxic sediment and can remain a potent toxin for many decades. Basically we should be coming out of the TBT hangover soon but marina dredging still spreads it around as does hydraulic shellfish dredging around marinas areas. These NGOs never gave a damn about any of this it is too politically controversial.

12/23/2025

12/22/2025

Again Friends of the Bay has been part of a misguided effort that destroys baymen's ability to make a living. The bait fishery for horseshoe crabs in NY has been highly regulated for decades and DEC told the governor that this ban was completely unnecessary. The governor caved.

Friends of the Bay board members Bill Bleyer and Eric Swenson proclaimed the need to follow science. In 1994 when the town leases 1800-acres to FMF Mr. Swenson was the head of the town's environmental department when the town illegally approved the lease without proper environmental review. In other words Eric Swenson was a primary author of the destruction of Oyster Bay by hydraulic shellfish dredges. The 4 recent essays on what to do with the leased lands after the lease ends have things in common:

NEITHER AUTHOR CAN BRING THEMSELVES TO MENTION HYDRAULIC AND SUCTION DREDGING EVEN ONCE.

Why because as a Newspaper Writer Bill Bleyer and other Newsday wrters could never even quote what the baymen were saying.

in 2017 when we exposed the fact that FMF had been out of compliance with federal permit requirement since 2008 we begged Friends of the Bay to ask DEC to require Water Quality Certification For FMF's sediment resuspension. Friends of the Bay went into lock step with the town protecting the dredging.

Dwight Relyea went into vengeance mode splitting from his brother Dave who ran the hatchery and ripping the bottom of the bay out. All during this time Friend of the Bay continued support Flower's dredging failing to ask the relevant question:

WHAT IS THE FATE OF THE 5-7 THOUSAND CUBIC YARDS OF SEDIMENT RESUSPENDED BY HYDRAULIC SHELLFISH DREDGES DAILY YEAR ROUND?

Friends of the bay is fund raising on banning horseshoe crab harvest and creating shellfish sanctuaries. The problem is that all the sanctuaries with the exception of the one in Mill Neck Creek are in the wrong place. The sanctuary in Cold Spring Harbor is a gift to the waterfront residents of Laurel Hollows and act of privatization the blocks the baymen from harvest wild softshell clams on the intertidal all along the waterfront.

THESE LARGE SANCTUARIES ARE IN THE WRONG PLACE AND THE GREAT ENVIRONMENTAL GROUP FRIENDS OF THE BAY AGAIN JUST COMPLETELY FAILED AS AN ENVIRONMENTAL GROUP!

Why because Friends of the Bay needed the sanctuaries to raise grant money and donations from an uninformed public. Instead of pushing back on the locations of the sanctuaries they push them though. When an environmental group is beholding to the town and the state they won't criticize. This is not an environmental group it is a political group tied root and branch to the politics of self flattery and flattery of politicians.

11/03/2025

The fight of baymen for access to public shellfish beds in towns around Long Island is captured in these stories. the oyster planters were taking seed from public lands to plant on their leases. The Hempstead story really hits home baymen were tonging clams when the town leased the land out from underneath them and the planters had the balls to then charge the baymen for taking natural clams and then to get leases to include natural clams run the baymen off and then dredge the clams.

Town and state politicians sold out their own constituents again and again.

Does that sound familiar?