Jamaica Bay-Rockaway Parks Conservancy

We're back with the 10th Annual Jamaica Bay #HorseshoeCrab Festival! 🐴👟🦀 Celebrate the ancient mating ritual of these charismatic "living dinosaurs" that come to our shores each year, helping provide a vital food source for migrating shorebirds (like the endangered Red Knot). 📍Meet at Sunset Cove Park Broad Channel, Queens 📅 Sunday, May 17 🕐 10am - 2pm More information at JBRPC.org/events OR the link in our bio 🔗 This festival is brought to you by @nycbirdalliance , @jbrpc , @jamaicabayguardian , @gatewaynps , @nycploverproject and @nycparks

Idk who needs to hear this but we got you. 🐎 🦀

We're hiring! 👋 Jamaica Bay-Rockaway Parks Conservancy (JBRPC) is seeking a motivated and enthusiastic School & Public Programs Educator to support the continued development and delivery of its education and public programs. 🧾 This role will grow JBRPC’s program capacity by facilitating grant-funded school field trips, early childhood family programs (Park Pals), and public programs across multiple park sites, with a particular emphasis on Floyd Bennett Field. 📚 Think you're a great fit? Or know someone who is? Full details on the position are at JBRPC.org/careers, or via the link in our bio 🔗

Thank you to PS 206K, @ps56harryeichler and @ps66jko for joining us at Canarsie Pier this week! 🦀 We had a great time learning about horseshoe crabs, mud crabs, fiddler crabs and the other organisms of our marine ecosystem. 🦀 These field trips are part of our "Wild Neighbors Watch" curriculum, which teaches 4th graders about how different species coexist. 🦀 To learn more about our education programs, head to jbrpc.org/school-programs

Volunteers! 👋 Did you know that you can earn points toward tickets to shows, merch, and more by participating in our cleanups? Through a partnership with Global Citizen (@glblctzn ), showing up for Jamaica Bay can turn into a concert or another reward. Here's how it works: ⭕️Download the Global Citizen App ⭕️Head to the discover page ⭕️Start the NYC: Show Up for Jamaica Bay Action Journey ⭕️Complete all steps (actions) in the Action Journey ⭕️Sign up for one of our upcoming cleanups via our eventbrite, linked within the app ⭕️For every journey you complete, you'll earn points on the app! ⭕️The points can then be used to enter to win rewards, like tickets to shows, merch, and more

🐎👟🦀 🐎 Each spring, thousands of Horseshoe Crabs come ashore to lay millions of eggs—creating the next generation of these unique “living fossils,” while also providing a vital food source for migrating shorebirds. 👟 Horseshoe Crabs date back to 450 million years ago, making them 100 million years older than dinosaurs (!) 🦀 Horseshoe Crabs are not actually crabs at all. They are marine arthropods, more closely related to spiders or scorpions. 🐎 Horseshoe Crabs are harmless to humans. Their telson (or tail) is not a threat—merely a tool to steer their bodies or right themselves when they flip upside down. 👟 Horseshoe Crab blood (which is bright blue) can be used to detect endotoxins, which is a crucial step in developing medicines. 🦀 Significantly, New York State enacted a Horseshoe Crab Protection Act in December 2025, which will shift the biomedical industry to synthetic alternatives. Want to meet one of these amazing creatures? Come to the 10th Annual Horseshoe Crab Festival on Sunday, May 17, from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. on the south shoreline of Broad Channel in Queens. Learn more at JBRPC.org/events, or at the link in our bio 🔗 This festival is brought to you by @nycbirdalliance , @jbrpc , @jamaicabayguardian , @gatewaynps , @nycploverproject and @nycparks

Spring migration is in full flight! 🦅 Did you know Jamaica Bay has s̵o̵m̵e̵ ̵o̵f̵ the best birding in NYC? 🦆😏 You don’t have to take it from us. @bk_reader just named Marine Park, Floyd Bennett Field and Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge as top spots for avian interaction. 📸 Learn more at the link in our bio 🔗 What’s more, we have a gaggle of nature events approaching. See the calendar at JBRPC.org/events 📸: @juliadeguz 🙏

Thank you to everyone who joined us for our Annual Pollinator Festival in Edgemere! Attendees learned about native bees, butterflies and other pollinating insects that support our coastline and urban habitats. More than that, budding gardeners helped install native plants at the Beach 43rd Street Waterfront Park, a treasured neighborhood communal space used for spring and summer gatherings, and as a kayak launch into Norton Basin. Participants also decorated terracotta pots, made seed bombs and took home their own pollinator-friendly native plants to care for at home. Spirits were not dampened, despite the rain! This event was brought to you jointly by @thegardenbythebay , @edgemerealliance and @jbrpc

We restored a meadow in Marine Park! 👏 By teaming up with @bloombergservice , @marineparkalliance and @nycparks , we were able to remove 40 invasive black locust trees, and repurpose the material for nature-based erosion control infrastructure. After removing the trees, Bloomberg volunteers helped us cut the trees down to size and tie them in bundles, to be deployed as tree fascines. 💪 These natural breakwater structures will be installed along the West Pond Living Shoreline at Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge, allowing native grasses to thrive and reinforce the marsh. 🌿 Removing these trees from Marine Park has the added benefit of allowing native meadow plants to grow, and depriving birds of prey roosting site they might use to hunt smaller birds (like the barn swallows seen in this video). 🌳 Thank you to the wonderful volunteers and partners for achieving so much in a single day! If you'd like to learn more about our West Pond Living Shoreline project, you can visit JBRPC.org/westpond OR head to the link in our bio 🔗

THANK YOU to the enthusiastic volunteers who joined us last Saturday at Gerritsen Beach at the south end of Marine Park. Together, 6️⃣0️⃣+ volunteers removed 5️⃣6️⃣1️⃣ pounds of debris! 💪 Thank you to @marineparkalliance and Councilwoman @mercedesnarcisse for partnering with us on this effort. 🙏 Want to get involved? Check our events page for the next volunteer opportunity at JBRPC.org/events, or the link in our bio 🔗

🥲🥲🥲 This baby terrapin was found last month at the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge by our Stewardship Programs Manager, Anil, while conducting a tour with @columbiasuma . While it's more common to see these tiny turtles in late summer or fall, some will appear in spring after spending the winter in their nest to survive the cold and limited food supply. 🐢 😭

Need another reason to get outside this Saturday? Celebrate spring and the essential role pollinators play in the ecosystems of Rockaway and Jamaica Bay at our Shoreline Pollinator Festival! 🌻 🌷 Free native plants to take home! 🌷 Decorate plant pots! 🌷 Plant a local park and give back! Join the Jamaica Bay-Rockaway Parks Conservancy, @thegardenbythebay , and the @edgemerealliance on Saturday, May 9 at 12:00 p.m. for this family-friendly event at 43rd Street Waterfront Park, where we’ll highlight native bees, butterflies, and other pollinating insects that support our coastal and urban habitats. 🐝 Head to JBRPC.org/events or the link in our bio for more info. 🔗 This video shows scenes from last year's Pollinator Festival 😊 📸: @climategirly