In 2021, New Jersey dropped about 400 donated gravestones and concrete rubble onto Barnegat Reef; 60 tons of monuments became new underwater habitat

Most of us probably think of gravestones as things that stay put. But in May 2021, hundreds of them ended up on the seafloor off New Jersey. According to the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) page on the project, state staff placed an estimated 400 gravestones and mixed concrete rubble on the Barnegat Light Reef. The material was about 60 tons in weight.

Where did the stones come from, and where is it?

The stone was donated to the New Jersey Artificial Reef Program by two businesses: Schick Monuments of Millville and South Jersey Monuments of Vineland. The process was taken care of by the staff of the state Bureau of Marine Fisheries. With this drop, they expanded New Jersey's artificial reef network. With help from the DEP’s Aids to Navigation Team, the material was placed at 39° 45.32′ N, 74° 01.60′ W, the reef’s exact location. The reef sits about 3 nautical miles east of Barnegat Inlet.


What is an artificial reef?

An artificial reef is a reef that is built by people. These reefs are usually made of concrete, steel, and decommissioned metal ships and barges. They often serve as habitat for marine life like black sea bass, tautog, and lobster and provide great opportunities for recreational anglers and divers. At Barnegat, granite gravestones and concrete rubble were added to the mix.

Why does New Jersey build reefs?

A 2021 New Jersey DEP research summary explains the need. It covers A Pilot Trap Survey of Artificial Reefs in New Jersey for Monitoring of Black Sea Bass, Tautog, and American Lobster, led by Rutgers University researchers Olaf Jensen and Douglas Zemeckis. The state's coast has little natural hard bottom, which helped spur a large reef program. It had 15 federally permitted reef sites and more than 4,000 patch reefs at the time. These reefs are vital to the recreational fishing and diving industries of the state.

Do fish really use the structure?

Yes, at least some do. The study laid traps on three New Jersey reefs from 2016 to 2018, on soft bottom, concrete, and metal. At all three reefs, catch of tautog was consistently higher on structure than on sand. Summer was the best time to catch black sea bass, and fall was best for tautog. No consistent pattern was observed across bottom types for black sea bass and lobster. In fact, at one reef, black sea bass catch was actually highest on sand.

Does the material matter?

Reefs are commonly built from two materials: concrete, such as reef balls, and metal, such as steel ships and subway cars. However, the degree to which each attracts and retains target species has not yet been examined. There was no clear winner between metal and concrete for tautog. That matters for Barnegat, which received granite monuments and concrete rubble. Granite was not one of the materials that was tested.

What we still don't know

No reef project is a magic fix. A 2025 paper in Fish and Fisheries, which looked at research published between 1970 and 2024, was co-led by Raymond Czaja Jr. and Shayna Sura. They found only 12 studies that measured the amount of new animal life that reefs actually produce. Only three used a control site. All three reported higher production on the reefs, but the authors say three studies are too few to draw any broad conclusions.

The larger question is attraction versus production. High catches on a reef may mean increased fish production. Or they could simply mean that existing fish are gathering there. Which of these is happening is still unclear. Attraction without added production can also create ecological traps. Fish gather in one spot, and heavy fishing there can deplete the local stock.

In the Rutgers pilot survey, researchers tracked the new Manasquan Inlet Reef before and after construction. Black sea bass catch increased by a net 1.07 fish per trap per day, but lobster catch decreased by a net 0.28. After 17 months of data, the overall impact of the reef was unclear. There are no published fish counts for the Barnegat gravestone drop. Definitive answers will require data from before construction and years of follow-up, the authors conclude.

More than a quirky reuse story

The Barnegat Light Reef project is a creative reuse of donated stone. While most of us might have imagined gravestones having only one particular purpose, under the waves they found a second life. These reefs can offer a good home to fish and lobsters and, for divers, something solid off a coast that has little natural hard bottom. But whether reefs like this give new life or just collect it is still an open question.