Bob Gaestel

Howell, New Jersey

How has the owner of a rural New Jersey horse farm helped in the battle to stem bacterial contamination of shellfish beds as well as a reservoir that provides drinking water for 250,000 people? With state and federal funding, in 1988 Gaestel built a manure- composting facility that annually removes over 24,000 tons of horse manure from the watershed of the Navesink River, and recycles it into a soil conditioner sold to landscapers and contractors.

"Any runoff you take off the Navesink River and the Swimming River Reservoir helps in its own way. They're clamming now where they haven't clammed in years, and I've had a little part in it."

Ocean Planet Exhibition Floorplan

gene carl feldman (gene@seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov) (301) 286-9428
Judith Gradwohl, Smithsonian Institution (Curator/Ocean Planet)