VERO BEACH, Fla. — A living shoreline has been installed at Riverside Park in Vero Beach. It's an effort to slow beach erosion.
The project was put in place by the Ocean Research and Conservation Association or ORCA. They've placed several oyster reef balls along the Riverside Park coastline. These will help recruit oysters, improve water quality and increase seagrass density and biodiversity.
Missy Weiss, director of citizen science and education, explained that living shorelines provide better protection than hardened shorelines like seawalls.
"As the waves are approaching the shoreline, that wave will hit the oyster reef ball and that wave energy will start to dissipate or weaken and so instead of that wave hitting the shoreline and eroding that sediment away, it'll hit the oyster reef ball and it'll slow that erosion down," Weiss said.
The oyster reef balls also include ground-up oyster shells built into the product to encourage oyster larvae floating in the water to seek habitat on the reef balls.
The project will continue for at least three years and volunteers will help ORCS monitor the site four times a year to assess the progress.
