The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation's Long Island Sound Futures Fund has announced a $677,700 grant to the National Audubon Society's Connecticut and New York Office to reduce disturbances to birds that are attempting to nest and raise chicks on beaches and islands across the Long Island Sound.
During the 2025 and 2026 breeding season, Audubon will monitor 70 coastal and island sites across Connecticut and New York where at-risk species like the federally-threatened Piping Plover, American Oystercatcher, and Least Tern are nesting.
Key outcomes will include implementing best management practices at 34 sites, hiring 86 WildLife Guards (high school students), interns, and young professionals to help drive the work, and engaging 700 volunteers in project activities.
Beach and island-nesting birds of the Long Island Sound face a multitude of threats. These birds are losing the habitat they need to survive as coastal areas become more populated, overdeveloped, and impacted by storms and flooding. Human disturbance therefore becomes a serious threat as the birds try to survive in the minimal habitat that remains.
While nesting shorebirds can accommodate a certain level of human proximity, continuous interactions with beachgoers leads to parents abandoning nests, eggs and chicks overheating in the direct sun, issues with small chicks being able to safely forage for food, and ultimately, mortality.
This project will help reduce threats to nesting shorebirds through hands-on stewardship—erecting fencing around nesting areas, installing predator exclosures around nests, and educating beachgoers with handouts and signage—at 34 coastal sites. Our successes will be turned into a template which others can use up and down the Atlantic coast.
We are excited to help save more birds through this new grant, which will impact -
Connecticut: Bridgeport’s Pleasure Beach, Sandy Point in West Haven, Milford Point in Milford, Long Beach in Stratford, and sites in Groton, Madison, Waterford, and others.
New York: The North Shore communities of Oyster Bay, Huntington, Smithtown, and others.
Along with our local partners, including the Connecticut Audubon Society, CT State Community College – Three Rivers Campus, and Group for the East End, we are thrilled to more deeply connect our Long Island Sound communities to their local wildlife.
