August 14, 1980 - Water,Water Everywhere...SECOND SECTION
Water,Water Everywhere...
Before the great glaciers left Long
Island tens of thousands of years ago the
area was vastly different than it is now.
The great Atlantic Ocean was 50, 100 or
more miles farther to the south and our
creeks and bays, as we know them today,
were merely run -off gutters from that
colossal wall of ice that stretched from
Wisconsin across the country to Cape Cod.
Of course, that ice was the very reason the
sea had retreated, for its water was then
stored in that glacier thousands of feet
high.
As the climate warmed up the ice melted
and the run -off fed the sea, gradually -
ever so gradually - the land with its trees,
marshes, and bays was partly swallowed
up by the ever - rising ocean.
In those days of glacier upon glacier and
time upon time, various patterns of land
were developed. The last glaciers gave us
the high bluff of the north shore (the
Harbor Hill Moraine). If followed east-
ward today it would be seen in the eroded
Plum, Gull and Fishers Islands. The deep
scar of Long Island Sound is part of where
the glacier stopped and it was partly
eroded by the rushing waters of glacial
melt.
The other great feature left by one of the
glaciers is the Ronkonkoma Moraine or
ridge that runs through the center of the
Island and on out to Montauk. Part of these
glacial movements also created the deep
lakes, and sometimes, the now dry, deep
depressions called kettleholes. These were
created by great chunks of glacial ice that
were plowed underground by the ad-
vancing glacier.
Ice Chunks Leave Lakes
Underground and protected by the earth
around and over them, the ice chunks
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remained unmelted till long after the
glacier above ground slowly melted north-
ward. These pieces of chunk ice in the
ground were the first "ice houses ", but
like all ice they l:ad to melt and when they
did they left great, deep lakes. The small
one we know is at Marratooka Lake op-
posite the Mattituck - Cutchogue High
School; and of course other larger ones we
all know are Lake Ronkonkoma and Lake
Success to the west of us.
Now that we know a bit about how our
island was formed, it will help us to un-
derstand where our fresh water here on
the island comes from. To the west there
are deep deposits of fresh water lying
below a vast, upper water supply. Notice
that I said to the west, for on the North and
South Shores the story is completely dif-
ferent. Here we merely have a shallow
water supply, with salt water below as well
as on both sides.
Slicing a cross section of the East End in
any area, we see below the ground surface
a layer of water at about sea level. As the
cross section moves inland from the
Sound, bay or ocean shore, the fresh water
level rises, creating a slight dome of
water. Originally this water was created
by glacial run -off and rain water that
accumulated through eons of time. As the
fresh water percolated into the ground it
forced the salt back, till a delicate balance
was established. And so looking at our
cross section we see a so- called bucket of
water rounded at the bottom and
spreading upward to the edges of our
shores; and it is here that any surplus rain
runs off when the "bucket" is filled.
Remember, when swimming along the
shore how you run into a cold spot of
water; this is surplus water spilling out
into the sea.
Danger of Salt Water Intrusion
Now, as every schoolboy knows, when
you put a straw into a soda and enjoy its
sweetness it soon empties. So it is with our
fresh water. If we pump out too much
water we'll empty it. However, in our case
the fresh water would be replaced by salt
water intrusion and our fresh water supply
would be gone forever. The trick is, and in
government they call it "planning ", not to
overdraw from the "bucket" of water
below. With only about 40 inches of rainfall
each year to replenish our bucket, we must
not overuse this limited yearly rainfall.
Good planning caa do this, but there are
always those with dollars in their eyes who
want to push for more and more use. It is
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AUGUST 14, 1980
PHRAGMITES GLISTEN WITH RAIN - -As water freshens the plants, it
also builds up our limited North Shore supply of fresh water below the
ground. Photo by Paul Stoutenburgh
these culprits we must continually watch.
The Town Planning Board, under the
leadership of John Wickham, and now
Henry Raynor, has done this job well, but
they need your support and understanding.
Years ago there were rumors that there
were underground streams that supplied
our water from Connecticut. This is ab-
solutely false. All our fresh water supply
comes from rain and snow that percolate
down into our open ground.
To make our water problem even more
acute we must also look at the shape of the
land on the North Shore. West of Mattituck
Inlet lies one of our greatest sources of
fresh water but remember our town line
ends where Laurel meets the Riverhead
line, right where LILCO was planning to
build its atomic generating plant and now
perhaps a coal -fired one in its place. (And
to think Riverhead was once part of
Southold Town!)
Town Has Three Island Masses
To understand this problem of land
mass, it is best to look at Southold Town'
from the air. When we do this we see it is
broken up into three distinct island,
masses, with only a thread of land
separating them from the Sound and bay.
The first so- called island is from Mattituck
Inlet to Arshamomaque ( Mattituck,
Cutchogue, Peconic and Southold). This is
where Southold Town beach is on the north
and Mill Creek Bridge to the south. The
second area (Greenport and East Marion)
is from Arshamomaque east to the
causeway in Orient and we all know how
thread -like this connecting land link is.
The last island is from the causeway to
Orient Point. Each of these land masses
has its own special dome of water, which
becomes less in quantity as we move
eastward. There is no natural connecting
link between any of them.
Understanding the above, one can now
see why there is so much concern about
our future water supply. It's very, very
limited and it can only be replaced by
rainfall. The key to all this is that we must
take care of what we have.... that we do not
overuse and we keep what is there usable.
Hard decisions are ahead and no matter
which way we move I'm afraid it's going to
be costly. The best things in life are no
longer free.
PAULSTOUTENBURGH
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