Nearly 50 years ago, officials from Massachusetts placed tons of tires on the bottom of the Nantucket Sound to create homes for marine life. Decades later, scientists went back to see if it worked. According to a 2020 study published in the journal Estuaries and Coasts, it did. Researchers from Northeastern University and the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries have compared fish behavior at four locations in the Sound and found that fish showed up on camera 93.4% faster in places with reef structures than in locations with open sand. This finding adds to a longstanding discussion within marine biology: do artificial reefs actually increase fish populations or do they simply attract fish from their natural environment?
A tire reef built in 1978, still standing strong
The study, ‘Comparison of Artificial and Natural Reef Productivity in Nantucket Sound, MA, USA,’ notes that the older of the two artificial reefs sits off Yarmouth. Established in 1978, the reef covers 127 acres and contains 2,500 reef modules made by packing three to five tires into concrete-filled bundles. According to the research paper, another artificial reef, which is slightly younger, was built in 2016 in Harwich and contains 1,600 yards of concrete rubble. Both reefs occupy areas where the ocean floor was originally flat and didn’t have any structure. Because Nantucket Sound’s floor is generally sandy, scientists have noted that any sort of hard surface attracts marine life looking for shelter, food, or protection from predators.
