Our Work
Source: Robert Lorenz
Watershed Planning
Long Island Sound is the receiving waterbody for nine major watersheds and hundreds of subwatersheds from Quebec to Connecticut and eastern New York. And the way that we manage land from source to sea has important consequences for the health of our rivers and Long Island Sound. The Sound is home to beautiful bays, estuaries, and beaches, but is also suffering from widespread bacterial contamination and hypoxia--a lack of oxygen in the water caused by excess nutrients and harmful algal blooms.
Save the Sound is working to address pollution problems by identifying pollution hotspots with our Sound Health Explorer tool, launched in the summer of 2015, as well as by engaging citizens in watershed-scale planning. Watershed planning allows us to take stock of conditions in a particular watershed and determine how we can better manage our land to protect and restore our rivers and the waters of Long Island Sound.
We work with our community partners to facilitate the watershed planning process. We work closely with coalitions, municipal officials, and project engineers to organize and guide the development of an EPA 9-Element Watershed Based Plan. Learn more about our work and the watershed plans that we have helped to create.
Click on the images below to access the watershed-based plans for the West River, the Pequonnock River, and the Rooster River.
For additional information about these Connecticut watersheds or to find out if your watershed has an EPA approved 9-element plan, visit the CT Department of Energy and Environmental Protections watershed plan database. New York residents, you can explore your watersheds by visiting the NY State Department of Environmental Conservation. If you live outside of Connecticut and New York, you can also visit the United States Environmental Protection Agency to "Surf Your Watershed."