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Clam Bayou to get a helping hand Saturday with planting

A habitat harmed by humanity will eventually sprout five lush islands to help water quality.

ST. PETERSBURG - A platoon of volunteers will root 556 trees and shrubs Saturday to restore a part of Boca Ciega Bay that development damaged as far back as the 1950s.

Cabbage palm, live oak, slash pine, saw palmetto, wild coffee and coral bean are among the native plants going into 2.3 acres on Clam Bayou in southwest St. Petersburg.

Eventually the plants will provide the forest for five islands project managers will carve to create a series of tidal channels and a meandering lagoon system, said environmental scientist Brandt Henningsen.

"Boca Ciega Bay has lost a tremendous amount of its original habitat. Projects like this at least give us an opportunity to give a little of it back," Henningsen said.

Henningsen is one of the leaders of the overall Clam Bayou restoration project, which Swiftmud, its surface water improvement program and the city governments of St. Petersburg and Gulfport have been pursuing in various ways since 1995. (Swiftmud is the common term for the Southwest Florida Water Management District.)

Plantings, trash removal and habitat revival have been among the project's major elements. Stormwater improvement also is on the agenda to combat pollution washing into the bayou.

In 1999, Swiftmud bought 87 acres next to the bayou. Crews took out exotic plants around the park and south of Twin Brooks Golf Course on 22nd Avenue S.

Clam Bayou Park leaps Boca Ciega Bay, taking in a section of St. Petersburg and another of Gulfport. Gulfport's share used to be known as Osgood Point. In St. Petersburg, the park is at the western end of 34th Avenue S.

The city bought parcels east and south of the park in 2003.

Civic activists are due much of the credit for helping preserve Clam Bayou, Henningsen said.

Trudy Archer, who has lived in the neighborhood all her life, is credited with starting the movement.

"Trudy is one of the reasons Clam Bayou came to our attention," Henningsen said.

The Florida Native Plant Society and the Florida Audubon Society are coordinating the volunteers for Saturday and will maintain the plants, Henningsen said.

He credits Lorraine Margeson and Bill Bilodeau, Florida Native Plant Society members, for organizing Saturday's event.

Margeson thought of the planting after she learned about plans for restoration and an extension of the Pinellas Trail near the bayou.

"I went, saw and was scared for the habitat," Margeson wrote in an e-mail.