Port Washington Watershed Biodiversity Coalition
Our Vision
A Port Washington Watershed where biodiversity is thriving and environmental education advances alongside our growing body of knowledge.
Our Mission
Protecting biodiversity and inspiring action through stewardship of habitats, education, and collaboration.
By the Numbers
700+ acres of diverse natural habitat managed
Ten local community-based organizations working together
Three watersheds united: Manhasset Bay, Hempstead Harbor, and the Long Island Sound
One growing movement for people and nature
Our Work
Protecting existing habitats
Conducting ecological and biodiversity assessments for land-use planning and conservation
Restoring waterbodies, riparian corridors, salt marshes, and shorelines
Connecting habitats through ecological corridors
Establishing habitat for the imperiled Monarch Butterfly, our flagship species
Partnering with community organizations
Promoting environmental education through citizen science, workshops, and presentations
Together, we’re shaping a healthier, more resilient future, transforming the ecological landscape of the Port Washington watershed, and working to fight nature-deficit disorder.
What is Biodiversity and Why is it Important?
What is Biodiversity?
Biodiversity is the variety of life — from ecological communities to species and populations, and to the genetic variation among individuals within those populations. The diversity of habitat types in Port Washington supports a wide range of ecological communities and species.
Why Conserve Biodiversity?
The importance of biodiversity has come to be widely accepted over the last five decades. Biodiversity is an indicator of ecosystem health, a reservoir for agricultural variety, a source of medicines, a supporter of watershed quality, a mediator against human disease and disease vectors, and an aesthetic and educational resource that enriches human experiences in nature.
Biodiversity enhances the resilience of ecological communities that sustain us. It also supports the provision of many ecosystem services: it can support clean air and water, mitigate pollution, sequester carbon, build and maintain healthy soils, and enhance resilience to climate change, sea-level rise, and severe storms and flooding.
Our Approach to Biodiversity Conservation
As a coalition, we work on a site-by-site basis to protect, connect, restore, and create habitats while addressing threats to biodiversity, including habitat loss, invasive species, pollution (including carbon pollution that drives climate change), and the overharvesting and unsustainable use of natural resources.
Addressing threats to biodiversity includes establishing and enhancing habitats with locally sourced native species, removing invasive species and restoring degraded habitats, converting lawns to meadows to support pollinator species, advocating for the responsible use of fertilizers and pesticides, and setting aside habitats to be free from intensive human disturbance.
Habitat maps in conjunction with field visits help us to describe, understand, and predict patterns of biodiversity and aid in identifying the locations and distributions of ecological communities and species of conservation concern. In addition, wetland maps help us to understand the connectivity of streams and groundwater systems with waterbodies and the local watersheds. A high-resolution map of Port Washington’s habitats and wetlands is provided, and the Coalition is continuing to map additional habitats extending into portions of Manhasset and Roslyn.
PWW Coalition Stewardship Locations Map (Interactive Link Here), a zoomable map that displays Coalition Members sites superimposed on aerial photographs.
Habitat Map of the Port Washington Peninsula Including Portions of Roslyn and Manhasset(High-Resolution Link), by David Jakim, 2013. These habitats were generated via remote sensing and verified in the field.
Wetland, Stream, and Waterbody Map (High-Resolution Link) by Jakim, 2013. This map shows the area’s water flow, drainage network into the watershed and sub-watersheds.
A Preliminary Biodiversity Assessment of the Hempstead Harbor Woods, by Erik Kiviat and Chris Graham from Hudsonia Ltd (2019) and a Preliminary Biodiversity Assessment and Environmental Study of the Hempstead Harbor Woods by David Jakim, 2014.
Working as a Watershed Coalition
A watershed is an area of land where all the water—rain, snow, groundwater, and streams—flows down-gradient into the same place, such as the subwatersheds of Manhasset Bay and Hempstead Harbor that in turn feed the Long Island Sound Watershed. The watershed provides a natural boundary for our coalition’s stewardship areas—one defined by the land and water.
The connectivity of freshwater, terrestrial, and marine environments are of critical importance to local ecological systems; they allow for species migration and provide wildlife corridors for species such as coyote, fox, deer, and rare species such as diamondback terrapin turtle, piping plover, and least tern.
Coastal disaster resilience is one of the most pressing issues in the Port Washington watershed. With as much as 2.5 feet of sea-level rise projected by 2050 and up to nine feet by 2100, our communities are at risk of losing their connection to the Long Island Sound. Coastal coalition members, including Leeds Pond Preserve, Manorhaven Preserve, and Sands Point Preserve, and the organizations that steward these habitats recognize the urgent need for coastal planning and action.
To tackle the enormous task of coastal resilience in the Port Washington Watershed, the Coalition is working with the NYS DEC to develop a pilot project using locally sourced kelp that to fertilize golf courses that will reduce nutrient loading from golf courses into Manhasset Bay. In addition, the Coalition is working with Transition Town Port Washington and other community groups to establish oyster reefs around Manhasset Bay with the Billion Oysters Project.
Salt marsh restoration at Mayor Newberger’s Cove by Bar Beach, Hempstead Harbor
East Creek, Overlooking Prospect Point, Port Washington
The Flagship and Umbrella Species that Connects Us: The Monarch Butterfly
The Monarch is an ideal species for environmental education and engagement with the living world—inviting curiosity, wonder, and mystery. The Port Washington Monarch Alliance was founded in 2017 as ReWild Long Island’s community outreach and education wing. The Monarch butterfly connects us all; it traverses and cross-pollinates all eight of the Coalition’s stewardship sites, as well as other natural habitats including meadows, forest edges, roadsides, and home gardens.
The mystery of Monarch migration from Canada to Mexico each year—four generations removed—returning to the very same and remote oyamel fir forests where their great-great-grandparents departed nine months earlier continues to confound scientists and laypersons alike. The Monarch remains one of nature’s most powerful reminders of both the fragility of life and how little we truly understand about the living world.
Monarch butterflies are threatened by climate change and the widespread loss of habitat, especially in the Midwest due to modern agricultural land-use practices. Biologists have determined that there is a strong possibility that this species, given its tumultuous population crashes and rebounds, could become extinct in the coming decades unless action is taken. We can help reverse this trend by planting milkweed and establishing Monarch Waystations. Monarch Waystations are sites containing nectar-producing plants and, crucially, milkweed (Asclepias spp.), which is the only genus of host plants on which Monarchs will lay their eggs and that supports the Monarch’s complete life cycle from egg to caterpillar to chrysalis to adult.
Coalition members and the Port Washington Monarch Alliance plant milkweed seeds and raise Monarchs from eggs to adulthood to share at public events, giving children and adults the chance to witness the opening of chrysalises and the spreading of wings for the first time. Children make a wish for the released Monarch, and a wish for themselves. Tanya Clusener, after a Monarch butterfly workshop by ReWild Port Washington in 2017, was inspired and has meticulously raised and released more than 9,500 Monarchs over the last several years. In October 2025, Sands Point Preserve and youth working with the Coalition created a Monarch Waystation to assist this imperiled species.
An umbrella species, creating habitat for Monarch butterflies also supports a great diversity of other wildlife. Milkweed plants are the documented larval host plants for six additional species of butterflies and moths, fourteen other dependent invertebrate herbivores, and eighteen predatory invertebrate species. In addition, fifteen birds, including declining species, have been reported to use milkweed plants: eleven species that hunt for and predate invertebrates attracted to milkweed, and four species that use milkweed fibers for their nests. Other local umbrella species include the Eastern box turtle, mole salamanders, the wood frog, diamondback terrapin, the North American river otter, the Eastern coyote, the Great Horned Owl, and the Osprey.
Monarch butterfly and bee nectaring on butterflyweed (Asclepias tuberosa), a type milkweed
Collecting butterflyweed seeds (Monarch host plant) for propagation with Long Island Native Plant Initiative (left) and orange butterflyweed in full August bloom (right) at the Guggenheim Preserve, Port Washington.
Ceremonial Monarch butterfly release at Leeds Pond Preserve, 2019Recent Panel Discussions and Presentations
A Port Washington Biodiversity Coalition Panel Discussion Moderated by Transition Town Port Washington 501(c)(3)
Hempstead Harbor Woods - Port Washington’s Least Known Treasure, by David Jakim
Dream it
Dream it
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